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NEW- YORK & LONB 

W ILEV AN I) P T N A .M 

MDC< CXLV. 







a^iDiEimi isii. 









s$>& 









Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1845, by 

W. M. GILLESPIE, 
In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New York. 



S *5 



R. Craighead, Printer, 
112 Fulton Street, New York. 



** 






PREFACE 



No two persons ever see the same thing, or receive identical 
impressions from even the same object in the same situation; 
and every visitor to Rome thus sees a different Rome from that of 
his companion. The Author may therefore, without presump- 
tion, hope to be able to present a picture of what he has seen, 
which shall be at the same time faithful to its original, and 
different in many points from its predecessors. He has selected 
from his Notes such objects, scenes, and incidents, as have 
seemed to him best adapted to convey to an American the most 
vivid and correct notions of Rome ; and he has endeavored to 
present them to the mental vision of the Reader, in the precise 
order, and with the characteristic peculiarities, which would 
strike his bodily eyes, if the realities were substituted for their 
descriptions, and were seen by the Reader, as by the Writer, 
with the ideas, prepossessions, and prejudices of an American 
and a New-Yorker. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. SAINT PETER'S 9 

Approach to Rome — Walk to St. Peter's — Bridge and Castle 
of St. Angelo— The Grand Piazza— St. Peter's— First Im- 
pressions — Details — Dome — Statue of the Apostle — His 
Chair — Monuments — Mosaic Pictures — Numerical Mea- 
surements — New York comparisons — Why its apparent 
size is disappointing — Ascent of the Dome into the Ball. 

II. THE FORUM AND COLISEUM 25 

Rome — The Forum and Coliseum by moonlight — Day-light 
visit — Arch ofSeptimius Severus — Temple of Concord — 
Temple of Saturn — Temple of Vespasian — Column of 
Phocas — Temple of Minerva Chalcidica — Temple of An- 
toninus and Faustina — Basilica of Constantine — Via 
Sacra — Arch of Titus — Temple of Venus and Rome- 
Coliseum. 

III. THE CAPITOL 36 

The Capitoline hill — Ancient grandeur — Palace of the Con- 
servatori — The Bronze Wolf — Gallery of pictures — 
Museum of Sculpture — The Dying Gladiator. 

IV. CHURCHES, IMAGES, RELIQUES, AND MIRACLES. 45 

Catholic Churches — The Madonna of San Agostino — Votive 
image on chimney — S. Maria in Via Lata — St. John Late- 
ran — Heads of St Peter and St. Paul ; Table of Last 
Supper, Column of Temple of Jerusalem, Well of Woman 
of Samaria, &c, — La Scala Santa — Santa Croce in Gerusa- 
lemme — List of reliques — Santa Maria d'Ara Coeli — 
Adventure with II Santissimo Bambino. 



VI CONTENTS. 

PAGE 
V. A DAY AMONG THE TOMBS OF ROME 57 

Sepulchre ot Scipio — A Columbarium — Tomb of Cecilia 
Metella — The Catacombs of St. Sebastian — Mausoleum 
of Augustus — Mausoleum of Hadrian — Tomb of the Baker 
Eurysaces — Mediaeval Monument in Santa Maria del 
Popolo — Cemetery of the Capuchin Monks — Protestant 
Burial Ground — Hydriotaphia. 

V!. THE VATICAN 67 

A Torch-light visit — The Colonnade — The Pauline Chapel 
— Galleria Lapidaria — Museo Chiaramonti — Nuovo Brac- 
cio — Library — Cortile del Belvedere — Laocoon, Apollo, 
&c. — Hall of Animals — The sleeping Ariadne — The 
crouching Venus — The Hall of the Muses, &c. — The Biga 
— The Etruscan Museum — Hall of the Candelabra — 
Tapestries of Raphael — Gallery of Pictures — Chambers 
of Raphael — His Loggie. 

VII. CHRISTMAS AT ROME 88 

The Pifferarii — High Mass before the Pope in the Sistine 
Palace — Music in the Church of San Luigi de' Francesi 
— Procession of the cradle of Christ in Santa Maria Mag- 
giore — II santissimo Bambino at Ara Coeli — High Mass 
by the Pope at St. Peter's. 

VHI. THE PALACES OF ROME 101 

Their peculiarities — Palazzo Doria-Pamfili — Sciarra — 
Barberini, with the Fornarina and Beatrice Cenci — Cenci 
— Spada — Borghese — Colonna — Rospigliosi,withGuido's 
Aurora — Quirinal Gardens — Villa Ludovisi, with the 
Aurora of Guercino — The Pope's golden key. 

IX. ANCIENT BATHS AND MODERN FOUNTAINS. ... 115 
Roman Baths — Baths of Caracalla — Baths of Titus — Sette 

Sale — Baths of Diocletian — Santa Maria degli Angeli — 
The Pantheon — The Aqueducts — Fountains of St. Peter's, 
Piazza Navona, Paolina, Aqua Felice, &c. — The Fountain 
of Trevi — A Washington Memorial. 

X. A ROMAN DINING-HOUSE AND CAFE 126 

Dinner in Rome — Trattoria del Lepre — Bill of fare — Wines 
— National dishes— Cafe Greco — An Artists' PonteMolle. 



CONTENTS. Vll 

PAGE 

XI. THE VELABRUM, GHETTO, AND TRASTEVERE. . . 137 

The Velabrum — Temple of Vesta — Mouth of Truth — Arch 
of Janus — Cloaca Maxima — House of Rienzi — The Roman 
daughter—The Ghetto — Condition of the Jews in Rome 
— The Mission and the Misericordia — The Trastevere — 
Ponte Rotto — Santa Cecilia — Corsini palace — Villa Far- 
nesina — San Pietro in Montorio — Villa Pamfili-Duria. 

XII. CARDINALS, MONKS, BEGGARS, AND ROBBERS. .150 
The Cardinals of Rome — A Cardinal's funeral — Cardinal 

Mezzofanti — Monks and Friars — Beggars; Roman, Eng- 
lish and American — Robberies, and an execution. 

XIII. A PROMENADE ON THE PINCIAN HILL 163 

The Pincian Hill— Trinita de' Monti— Villa Medici— Villa 
Borghese — Casino — Pauline's Statue — Villa Torlonia — 
A neighbor's funeral. 

XIV. SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS 175 

Foreign artists resident in Rome — Thorwaldsen — English 
sculptors — Overbeck, &c. — American Painters ; Leutze, 
Huntington, Freeman, Brown, Terry, &c. — American 
sculptors — Crawford; his Orpheus, Genius of Mirth, 
Hebe and Ganymede, Adam and Eve, Ideal busts, Bassi- 
relievi, &c. — Classical and Ideal Art — The Washington 
Monument. 

XV. THE MODERN ROMANS. 192 

Their struggles for liberty — The Government a Missionary 

society — Knowledge discouraged — Ignorance of America 
— Activity and acuteness of the Roman intellect — Super- 
stition — Inquisition — Industry — Benevolence — Society — 
C onclusion . 

Appendix. How to see Rome 207 

The Duomo of Milan 214 



ROME 

AS SEEN BY A NEW YORKER. 



I. 

SAINT PETER'S. 

"Roma!" shouted the postilion with his stereotyped 
emphasis and a melodramatic wave of his whip over the 
desolate Campagna, as a turn in the road disclosed in 
the distant horizon an irregular mass of churches, towers 
and palaces, above which rose supreme a huge dome at 
once recognized as that of Saint Peter's. A traveller 
becomes callous to the excitement of famous names and 
historical associations, for he daily eats and sleeps in their 
shadow ; but Rome has a spell to arouse the most phleg- 
matic, and the attainment of this goal of every voyager 
seemed like a dream, which at the very next moment 
might vanish into thin air. But as we advanced, infinitely 
too slowly for our eager excitement, through the Campag- 
na, so silent and barren that it seemed impossible that so 
great a city could be so near, its battlemented walls sud- 
denly came into view, and the Tiber itself was crossed 
2 



10 ROME. 

by the Ponte Molle, the same on which Cicero arrested 
the ambassadors of the Allobroges, and whence Constan- 
tine had his vision of the cross. Passing on between 
the high walls of villas and gardens, and getting occa- 
sional glimpses of the luxuriant beauty which they en- 
closed, we at length reached the gates, passed through 
the Porta del Popolo, and entered a grand Piazza, in the 
centre of which stood an Egyptian obelisk, while on the 
left rose the terraced gardens of the Pincian hill, and in 
front were two churches with symmetrical porticoes, 
cupolas and bell -towers. On each side of them two 
broad streets spread out to the right and to the left, and 
between them the Corso led through the palaces of mod- 
ern Rome to the ruins of the Capitol and Forum. The 
Coup oVozil was almost worthy of even tins Empress of 
cities. 



Rome is in its single self a whole world of wonders, 
ancient and modern, and the newly-arrived traveller finds 
himself bewildered in the " embarrassment of riches.'' 
St. Peter's calls him on one side, the Coliseum on 
another ; a living Pope rivals a dead Emperor ; the 
Apollo Belvidere is a mile from the Dying Gladiator; 
the Forum, the Pantheon, the Tarpeian rock, the Tem- 
ple of Vesta, the Catacombs, and the thousand other 
objects of deep interest are scattered over an immense 



ST. PETERS. 11 

area, and attract you in every direction, so that if their 
magnetic powers were all equal, they would keep you 
balanced immoveably in their centre, like Mahomet's 
coffin at Mecca, and you would see nothing because there 
was so much to see. But a trifle will turn the scale of 
an even balance, and the accident of the day after my 
arrival being Sunday, directed my first steps to the 
church of St. Peter's. 

Accompany me in fancy, and imagine yourself turning 
westward from the Corso, and following a narrow and 
crooked street between high houses, occupied by petty 
shops and interspersed with a few palaces, till you reach 
the yellow Tiber. We will silently indulge in our medi- 
tations on the banks of this famous river, stopping on the 
bridge of St. Angelo, by which we cross it, to consider 
how typical this structure is of Rome itself, for while its 
massive arches remain unmoved since they were founded 
by the ancient Romans, they "are now surmounted by 
twelve of the saints and angels who characterize the 
modern city. Beyond it is the Castle of St. Angelo, el 
massive circular tower, erected by the Emperor Hadrian 
for his own Mausoleum, but now converted into the 
strongest fortress of Papal Rome. You continue to 
advance, and soon after passing the palace of Prince 
Torlonia, you emerge from the narrow street into a mag- 
nificent amphitheatre enclosed by a grand colonnade and 
terminated by St. Peter's itself. In the middle of this 
spacious piazza rises an Egyptian obelisk ; on each side 



12 ROME. 

of it play high and graceful fountains, and the two serai- 
circles of the embracing colonnade are formed by three 
hundred columns, forty feet high, sweeping around the 
piazza in quadruple rows, and crowned by colossal 
statues of saints. At the end of the curves, straight wings 
lead up the rising ground, on the top of which stands St. 
Peter's. The great dome first catches your eye, which 
is met in its descent by the smaller ones on either side, 
and then falls on the vast front, which forms a pyramidal 
mass with the domes, but by itself would seem too broad 
for its height, and more like a palace than a church. Its 
solidity is lightened by three tiers of windows, enriched 
with pediments and balconies, and combined by columns 
and entablatures into a striking, if not a perfect whole. 
Advancing towards the mighty edifice, which, like Mont 
Blanc, seemed to you close at hand, when you caught 
your first glimpse of it, but which now appears to recede 
as you cross the colonnaded piazza, and ascend the broad 
steps and platform, you at length stand in the grand 
Vestibule. A heavy curtain closes the door of the 
church — you raise it — a peal of sacred music salutes 
you — -and you enter " the most glorious structure that 
has ever been applied to the uses of religion." 

Your first impression is of magnificent vastness. 
You see nothing distinctly ; you are dazzled by the 
splendor lavished on everything which surrounds you ; 
you are confused by the gorgeous waste of columns, 
statues, pictures, precious metals, gildings, and mosaics — 



st. peter's. 13 

the lavish tribute of Mammon to Heaven. Gradually 
the rich confusion clears up, as if a veil of mist had been 
raised, and your eye and mind pierce through the elabo- 
rate magnificence of the details to the simple grandeur 
of the design. You look down the far perspective of the 
broad and long-drawn aisle, and see in the distance the 
high altar, surmounted by a tabernacle a hundred feet 
high, resting on columns of bronze wreathed with golden 
foliage, before which a hundred lamps burn night and 
day. Parti-colored marbles tesselate the pavement 
unincumbered by pews, and the arched roof is gorgeous 
with golden panels and rosettes. The sides of the 
great aisle are enclosed by alternating open arches and 
massive piers. Over each arch are recumbent statues of 
the Virtues, and each pier is faced with two white mar- 
ble pilasters, between which are niches enclosing 
statues of saints ; and, when you find that they are 
giants, sixteen feet high, instead of the ordinary size, 
which they first appeared to be, and that each of the 
infant cherubs, who support the vases of holy water near 
the doors with such inviting looks, is a young Hercules, 
you then first begin to appreciate the colossal scale of 
everything around you. 

On each side of the great aisle run narrower ones, 
and from them branch off many chapels, each of which 
is of itself a large church with organs and altars.. Pro- 
ceeding up the main aisle, and feeling more and more 
your own insignificance in the greatness around you, you 
2* • 



14 



at length stand under the great Dome. Its stupendous 
vault spreads above you like a glittering firmament, and 
is supported by four piers, of the size of which you may 
form some idea, when you learn that there is in the city 
another church (that of San Carlino, opposite the Ameri- 
can Consulate) which contains three altars with their 
usual accessaries, and yet is only precisely the size of 
one of these piers ! From them the cupola rises with 
such airy grandeur, as fully to justify Michael Angelo's 
boast that he had hung the Pantheon in the air. From 
the windows in its sides the light streams down on the 
high altar, and the concave vault above them is covered 
with mosaics of Christ, the Madonna and hovering 
angels. It is in effect a Christianized temple of ancient 
Rome, raised upon a modern Cathedral ; emblematic, 
perhaps, of the compound nature of the religion in whose 
honor it was erected. 

The Transepts, or cross aisles, stretch out to the right 
and to the left, and in them are arranged the Confessional 
boxes for different languages, not merely for the great 
ones, as English, French, Italian, &c, but for even the 
dialects of Illyria, Hungary, Poland, and the like, so that 
penitents from all parts of the world may here congre- 
gate and confess their sins in their mother tongue to a 
priest of their own people. Whatever your own belief 
may be, you cannot avoid admiring the grandeur of the 
idea which thus brings together the faithful from all parts 



st. peter's. 15 

of the world, to unburthen their souls in the bosom of 

the all-embracing Mother Church. 

Beneath the High Altar is the grave of St. Peter, and 

near it is the bronze statue of the Apostle, sitting with 

uplifted arm and extended foot. Antiquarians assert that 

the statue originally represented Jupiter Capitolinus, and 

that it is only changed in name ; but however this may 

be, it does not affect the reverence paid to it. Before it 

are always kneeling in prayer, men, women, and children, 

who after due preparation rise from their knees, approach 

the statue, press their foreheads to the well-worn toe 

j 

and then kiss it most devoutly. They are chiefly peas- 
ants, and often way-worn travellers who come hither to 
render thanks for their safe arrival ; but one day I saw a 
portly priest with a showy footman behind him, stop as 
he passed the statue, and glance at the people kneeling 
around ; and then, as if to set a good example in high 
places, he wiped the toe with his handkerchief, and 
applied it to his forehead and lips. Remembering the 
philosophical maxim, " When you are in Rome, do as 
Rome does," I gravely imitated his doings with hand- 
kerchief, forehead and lips, but could not discover that I 
was any better or worse the rest of the day — probably 
owing to my want of faith. 

At the extreme end of the church four colossal 
statues, representing the principal doctors of the Greek 
and Latin churches, support a lofty throne and canopy 
of bronze, within which is preserved the patriarchal 



16 ROME. 

chair of St. Peter himself. It is shown to the people 
only for a moment, on great festivals, and is venerated 
by them as a true relic of the Prince of the Apostles ; 
but unbelievers whisper that when the heretical French 
had possession of the city, they found on the chair the 
Arabic inscription, " There is but one God, and Mahomet 
is his prophet!" This makes it probable that the 
chair was brought from Palestine by some of the early 
Crusaders. 

In whatever direction you turn your eyes, they meet 
statues, pictures, and monuments. The tombs of the 
Popes are ranged against the walls and piers, and are 
magnificent commemorations of their riches and power. 
Most of them bear a kneeling statue of the Holy Father, 
supported by allegorical figures of religion, charity, 
wisdom, prudence, and the like. But more interesting 
than these is the monument of the Stuarts, the last 
descendants of the former kings of Great Britain — the 
self-styled James III., Charles III., and Henry IX., of 
England — who here repose beneath a mausoleum erected 
by the generosity of their Hanoverian successor, 
George IV. Beside it, Sir Walter Scott, when in 
Rome, passed hours in abstracted contemplation, medi- 
tating on the sad fate of that royal race to whom his 
heart, if not his head, was so devotedly attached. All 
the tombs are surmounted by groups of statuary, but 
many isolated and colossal statues of saints — a reverend 



st. peter's. 17 

assemblage of Christian heroes — look down upon you 
from niches in the walls. Their deeds of charity and 
power, and those of their Master, are recorded in the 
pictures which enrich the pillars, and which are executed, 
not in fading oil-colors, on perishable canvass, but in 
unchanging and lasting mosaics, whose brilliant hues are 
fused in stone itself, and will be as beautiful after a 
thousand years, as they are at the present moment, in 
which they imitate, so perfectly, those masterpieces of 
painting, of which they are copies, that you can scarcely 
credit that they are formed by many thousands of little 
colored tessera. The impression of durability and 
permanence which their material conveys, harmonizes 
with the whole tendency of the cathedral, and exalts 
your admiration of the far-sighted, greatness of mind of 
its builders. 

Numerical measurements convey only indistinct notions 
of greatness, and seem too mechanical for an object of 
sublimity, but a few such may give more precision to our 
ideas. All the writers on St. Peter's differ on its dimen- 
sions, but the following are among the best authenticated. 
The internal length of the church is 613 feet ; the height 
to the top of its cross, 430 ; the length of its transepts, 
445 ; and the height of its main aisle, 150 feet. The 
building covers nearly six acres of ground ; more than 
twice as much as the London St. Paul's, all the three 
aisles of which are no wider than the single main aisle 
of St. Peter's, while its height is sixty feet less. Or, to 



18 



ROME. 



employ comparisons more familiar to New Yorkers, St. 
Peter's would cover two-thirds of our whole Park, from 
its lower end to Chambers-street, and ten of our City- 
Halls could be placed, side by side, on its pavement, 
while a dozen of our three-story houses might be piled, 
one above the other, and then would scarcely reach its 
top. Three centuries have passed in its completion, and it 
has cost sixty millions of dollars ; enough to have built a 
hundred and twenty New York City Halls.* 

The wonderful Temple of Jerusalem with its blocks 
of stone sixty feet long and its hundred and sixty-two 
columns, each a single shaft of white marble — the Tem- 
ple of Diana, at Ephesus, with its hundred and twenty- 
seven pillars sixty feet high — the Temple of Jupiter 
Capitolinus, looking down on the Forum of ancient Rome 
with a triple row of pillars in front, and a double row on 
the sides — none of these greatest of the monuments of 
ancient religions equalled the modern church of St. 



* The following tabular statement shows the dimensions in feet 
of St. Peter's, and of the churches most frequently compared 
with it. 





JLength 
'.Inside.) 


Breadth 
(Inside.) 


Height. 


Cross length 
ofTransepts. 


Height of 
Nave. 


St. Peter's : Rome 


613 


131 


430 


445 


150 


Duomo ; Milan 


■177 


185 


345 


283 


151 


St. Paul's ; London 


500 


107 


370 


248 


88 


Trinity ; JSTewYork 


170 


72 


264 


72 


67§ 



st. peter's. 19 

Peter. Why then is it that this most magnificent of all 
human" structures never fails to disappoint the visitor, 
and appears so inferior to its real greatness ? Byron 



" Enter : its grandeur overwhelms thee not ; 
And why ? it is not lessened, but thy mind, 
Expanded by the genius of the spot, 
Has grown colossal." 

This explanation is, however, more poetical than philo- 
sophical, and more flattering to one's self-love than satis- 
factory to one's reason. The common cant of criticism 
asserts that the building appears so much smaller than it 
really is in consequence of its proportions being so per- 
fect. The absurdity of this dogma will be shown by inter- 
preting it. An object is most perfect whenit best fulfils 
the end of its creation. A temple devoted to religion is 
intended to impress the mind with feelings of sublimity, 
awe and reverence. Apparent magnitude is a most im- 
portant element in producing these impressions, for, 
though Mont Blanc is sublime, an exact miniature 
model of it would be only a curious white molehill. If, 
then, a gigantic temple is so proportioned by its archi- 
tect as to lessen the effect of its size, it is so far a failure, 
and its proportions are imperfectly adjusted to attain their 
proper end. Such is the case with St. Peter's. The 
Roman Pantheon, on the contrary, appears larger than it 
really is ; so that the grandest of Christian temples is 
less perfect than the original model of its mere dome ; 



20 ROME. 

so inferior is modern to ancient genius. Two causes 
unite to lessen the apparent magnitude of the church. 
One is the profusion of ornament on all its parts, which 
fritters away the effect of the great whole ; but the chief 
cause is the colossal size of the statues with which it is 
studded. They are our natural standards of comparison, 
and artists place figures of men in their landscape paint- 
ings, that we may compare them with the temples, pala- 
ces, and precipices, and judge from them how large these 
objects are. So in St. Peter's, looking at the colossal 
statues, and instinctively supposing them to be of ordinary 
size, we measure by their scale the length, breadth, and 
height of the church, and we find that, thus estimated, it 
is not so many times larger than the height of a man, as 
we had expected. Such has seemed to me, after careful 
consideration, to be the chief cause of the disappointing 
and disparaging impression, so hard to analyze, but so 
easy to perceive. 

But you cannot fully appreciate the magnitude of the 
edifice, till you have ascended to its top. To do this, a 
formal permission from the Cardinal Secretary of State 
is necessary, but it is easily obtained by a trifling fee to 
a sexton. It must be countersigned by one of the party, 
who thereby guarantees that none of his companions will 
break their necks on the way. This permit we pre- 
sented at a door in the left aisle under the monument of 
the wife of the English Pretender, James III., and then 
began to ascend a wide and easy flight of steps, so 



st. peter's. 21 

broad and gentle that a carriage might drive up it, and 
that horses do indeed mount it with their loads. Slabs 
of marble are inlaid in the walls commemorating the 
various great personages who have made the ascent. No 
Yankee had been thought worthy of any of the twenty- 
one tablets. Two Princesses of Saxony had entered 
the Ball ; an exploit not very feminine, and particularly 
awkward for the wearers of frocks. The Due d'Aumale, 
a month before, had ascended to the ball, but not into it, 
being beaten by the ladies. Of the Due de Bordeaux, 
the French Pretender, the tablet said that " His Royal 
Highness honored the cupola with his visit." — " S. A. R. 
Enrico Due di Bordeaux onoro di sua visita la cupola 
Vaticana." The word "honored" is not used in any 
other case, and its employment in this one shows that 
the sympathies of the Court of Rome are with the young 
Pretender rather than with the reigning King of the 
French. Winding up the sloping road, we at length 
reached the roof, which is like a village built on a rock, 
for the marble covering of the six acres slopes in every 
direction and sustains houses in which live the workmen 
employed in repairs. Various smaller cupolas shot up, 
looking larger than the great one itself appeared from 
below, a fountain was playing, dogs and cats seemed 
quite at home, and we could scarcely credit that 
we were a hundred and fifty feet in the air. Next 
ascending a smaller winding stair-case, we stepped 
out into the gallery at the bottom of the drum or cylin-, 

3 



22 ROME. 

drical part of the cupola, and looked down into the 
church, being then nearly two hundred feet above the 
pavement. The aisles looked even longer than when we 
stood upon their floor, being less foreshortened, but the 
priests seemed like dolls, and the tabernacle over the 
altar, immediately under us, though known to be ninety- 
three feet high, dwindled down into a trifling projection. 
The mosaic paintings of the Evangelists, when viewed 
from below, had seemed well finished, but were here 
seen to be composed of roughly fitting and coarsely 
colored cubes of stone, and the pen in the hand of St. 
Mark proved to be six feet long. Just below us were 
four niches adorned with spiral columns, believed to 
have been brought by the Emperor Titus from the Tem- 
ple of Jerusalem. They were said to contain four pre- 
cious relics, to wit, a piece of the true cross ; a handker- 
chief, with the miraculous impression of the features of 
Christ ; the lance which pierced his side ; and the head 
of St. Andrew. 

Thence we mounted to the gallery at the top of the 
drum, and then climbed a zig-zagging series of steps 
within the thickness of the dome, and between its inner 
and outer shells, bending our bodies as we advanced, to 
conform to its curvature. Both these shells are here 
true domes of stone, while in the London St. Paul's the 
inner one is a brick cone, and the outer one is of wood 
covered with copper. In this way we attained the foot 
of the lantern, and could thence admire the fine mosaic 



st. peter's. 23 

on its ceiling, depicting the Father surrounded by che- 
rubs and enveloped in clouds. We were now three hun- 
dred and sixty-four feet above the pavement, and from 
the outer gallery had a widely extended view, but the 
elevation was too great to make it satisfactory, all the 
objects being flattened down into one plane. All over 
the cupola are seen the triple hills, which were the arms 
of Pope Alessandro VII., of the Ghigi family, who re- 
paired it in 1655. On the ribs and corners remained the 
projecting iron points on which are stuck the candles 
for the great illuminations of the Holy Week. Six 
thousand lights are then kindled almost instantaneously, 
and, looking down from the dizzy height, we could fully 
realize the dangerous nature of the duty, which is so ex- 
treme that the eighty men who perform the task, always 
take the sacrament before commencing it. Again we 
had to ascend by another staircase, which wound around 
the lantern, and finally brought us to its top, and to the 
foot of the stem which supports the ball and the cross. 
This stem is hollow, and contains a perpendicular iron 
ladder, which we climbed, and squeezed ourselves 
through the narrow aperture into the Ball. It is eight 
feet in diameter, and the guide says that it can hold six- 
teen people. A prudent man would rather not be one of 
the sixteen, for with only two friends and myself, it 
seemed to sway back and forth, and to yield to every 
gust of wind, and we could readily fancy that the thin 
sheet copper of which it is made might easily give way, 



24 



or that our weight might topple it down from its proud 
eminence, and make it bound from lantern to dome, and 
from dome to roof, till it should at last strike the ground, 
with its precious contents, four hundred and thirty feet 
below its starting point. We did not, therefore, remain 
in it long ; but before descending, we shook hands most 
heartily, demanding, "Where shall we three meet again ?" 
Certainly not in the Ball of St. Peter's.* 

* A Note, descriptive of the rival of St. Peter's, the Duomo of 
Milan, may be found in the Appendix. 



25 



II. 

THE FORUM AND COLISEUM. 

The chief ruins of ancient Rome lie in the southern 
extremity of the city, as far as possible from the inhabited 
district, as if the degenerate modern Romans shrank 
from the sight of these solemn tokens of what their ances- 
tors had been, and dared not contrast their present degra- 
dation with their former glory. The annual swarms of 
strangers — those hordes of modern Goths who now rush 
down from the tramontane regions, not to destroy, but to 
admire and to sustain — all crowd together under the 
northern walls. A mile to the south are the Capitol, the 
Forum and the Coliseum. On a summer-like evening in 
the beginning of December, I strolled alone down the 
Corso, passing churches and palaces, till this narrow 
" Broadway" of Rome divided at the foot of the Capito- 
line hill. Taking the left hand branch, and leaving the 
Capitol on my right, I followed the narrow and dark 
Via di Marforio, till suddenly I emerged from its sha- 
dows, and a blaze of moonlight lit up for me the Roman 
Forum, which spread out before my dazzled eyes in a 
wide waste of ruins, entered by a triumphal arch, termi- 
nated by the Coliseum,, and dotted with columns, stand.-* 



26 ROME. 

ing singly and in groups, crowned with moss-grown frag- 
ments of their cornices, and looking like tall mourners 
over the fallen greatness of their companions, or like the 
sole survivors of the field of battle on which the great 
works of man had contended in vain with the destroying 
angel of Time. A thrill of neither pleasure nor pain, 
but of intense quivering excitement, ran through every 
nerve, till my very fingers' ends tingled with enthusiasm. 
Such a unique and never-to-be-repeated sensation is alone 
enough to repay a dozen voyages across the Atlantic. 
Behind me a broad and lofty flight of marble steps led up 
the hill of the Capitol ; before me rose the triumphal 
arch erected in honor of the Emperor Septimus Severus ; 
on the right stood three columns of a ruined temple ; 
beside them were eight pillars of another edifice ; and a 
little farther rose the lonely column of Phocas. I 
walked on in solitude through the fields which were 
once the Forum in which the people met to decide upon 
the fate of empires, and in which the eloquence of Cicero 
had re-echoed from the temples and palaces which then 
studded every eminence and filled every valley, but which 
have now left only these scattered fragments for their 
memorials. There " a thousand years of silenced fac- 
tions sleep," and the deep hush was unbroken, except by 
my own footsteps, till I was challenged by the sentinel 
before the Coliseum. The colossal amphitheatre rose 
like a mountain of stone, with stupendous arches above 
arches, half hid in deep shade and half bathed in the 



THE FORUM AND COLISEUM. 27 

splendor of a day-bright moon. In the oval area within, 
in which so many gladiators had slain each other, and so 
many Christians had been torn to pieces by wild beasts, 
now rose a tall cross in emblem of the new religion which 
had changed the destinies of the place. On the arches 
which sloped up and back all around, and which once 
bore the seats of the ninety thousand spectators who 
there exulted in the butchery of the arena, trees were 
now growing high in air, and the long grass threw its 
veil over the yawning chasms. In the interior galleries, 
arcades and passages which form an immense labyrinth, 
I wandered for hours, climbing to the topmost arches to 
avoid an English party, whose ladies were giggling and 
babbling below in profane desecration of the influences 
of the spot. In such scenes, one's mind becomes fused 
and incorporated with the genius of the place, and I could 
almost fancy myself an old Roman, and forget the cruel- 
ties of the conquerors of the world in admiration of their 
greatness of conception and execution, until the place 

1 " Became religion, and the heart ran o'er 
With silent worship of the great of old, 
The dead, but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule 
Our spirits from their urns." 

On my way out, I stopped to t- itinel at 

the entrance, stationed there to protect visitors from the 

robberip- f aem at that lonely spot. He 

ntier of the Papal States, and 

--eu because he had no work. The Holy 



28 



Father paid him only four cents a day, besides his rations 
of a half pound of meat, two pounds of bread, a pint of 
soup, and a pint of wine, which is here indispensable to 
the poorest. No wonder that the needy creatures are 
reputed to be none too honest. Leaving this degenerate 
" Roman warrior" on his post, I returned home without 
molestation, though it was now near midnight ; but the 
next day I heard that two persons had been that night 
robbed and stabbed in the Via di Marforio, at just about 
the time that I was passing through it. " Che sard sard.'' 1 
The next two days were fully occupied in a minute 
study of the antiquities spread over this district. The 
surface of the ancient Forum (now, alas ! degraded to a 
cattle-market!) has been raised fifteen or twenty feet by 
the gradual accumulation of ruins and rubbish. Exca- 
vations have therefore been made around the columns 
and arches, down to their bases and to the ancient pave- 
ment, and are now walled around. You enter the exca- 
vated portion by an arched passage, and stand upon the 
old Roman pavement. The Arch of Septimius Severus 
was erected over the road by which returning conquerors 
ascended to the Capitol, and you may now follow in their 
teps and tread on the original broad polygonal stones, 
v n thus smooth by the pas sag e of so 
many triump! \,. is. Beside the Arch stood 

the Temple of Co?icoru, ] "^served only its 

pavement of variegated maiole r :ich 

carvings which once adorned it. Evei j .. 



THE FORUM. 29 

^f columns, capitals, and entablatures are 
Scatt mderful profusion. Near it are three 

deeply fluted columns ining part of their origi- 

nal purple dye), wlii md to be the 

remains of the temple which Augi 
Tonans, or the Thundering Jove, in his grati-tud 
escape from lightning, in Spain, but which are proved 
by recent discoveries to belong to the Temple of Saturn, 
as Niebuhr, with wonderful acuteness, had previously 
conjectured. They were formerly buried nearly to the 
top in a mass of rubbish, which was removed by the 
French during their occupation of the Imperial City, and 
the traveller is indebted to them for many similar favors, 
which he might never have obtained from the far-niente 
of the Papal government. Opposite to these stand eight 
granite columns, crowned with an entablature and a 
fragmentary pediment. Early antiquaries thought that 
they had been consecrated to Concord ; later ones to 
Fortune ; and now they are decided to belong to the 
Temple of Vespasian. This constant changing of names 
is almost universal among the Roman antiquities, and is 
most annoying to the traveller and most dangerous to his 
classical faith, but he had better believe implicitly all 
he is told, if he would not weaken or destroy the depth 
of his impressions. The single column standing a little 
beyond these was long a subject of mysterious specula- 
tion. Byron exclaims, 

" Tully was not so eloquent as thou — 

Thou nameless column with a buried base" 



30 ROME. 

but it is no longer nameless, for the excavations lil 
made by the Duchess of Devonshire 7 
an inscription on the pedest- 1 ..dvebeen 

erected to the En • • - L iier on in the midst 

of the F - beautiful Corinthian columns, 

most perfect models of that order, and 
e lormerly supposed to belong to the temple erected 
to Jupiter Stator, in gratitude for his stopping the flight 
of the Romans from before their enemies ; but their 
names have also been changed, and they are now con- 
sidered the remains of the Temple of Minerva Chalcidica. 
Opposite to them is the unaltered front of the temple 
dedicated by the Senate to Antoninus and Faustina, but 
behind the noble portico a modern church rears its con- 
torted head. A little farther on are the gigantic arches 
and niches of the Basilica of Constantine, under which 
lie huge fragments of masonry, which have fallen from 
its top. In front of it passed the Via Sacra, along which 
Horace used to walk, as he tells us, 

" Ibam forte Via Sacra, sicut meus est ?nos," 

and you may now tread in his steps. Beside it Galen 
had his Apothecary's shop, which, he informs us, was 
burnt down in the " Great Fire" of the Basilica behind 
it. Across the road was the shop in which Yirginius 
bought the knife with which he stabbed his daughter, to 
save her from Appius Claudius. Not far distant is the 
spot where yawned the great gulf into which the self- 



THE FORUM. 31 

devoted Curtius leaped to preserve the Roman people. 
Such are the recollections which here hallow the ground 
about you, and so dream-like is the sensation of standing 
in the midst of such scenes, that you almost fear to close 
your eyes for even a moment, lest, when you re-opened 
them, you should find that everything had passed away 
like "the baseless fabric of a vision." 

Proceeding along the Via Sacra you pass under the 
Arch of Titus, erected by the Senate and People in 
commemoration of the destruction of Jerusalem. On 
one of its sides are sculptured the captive Jews bearing 
the spoils of the Temple, among which are distinctly 
visible the golden table, the seven-branched candlestick 
and the silver trumpets. They are the only authentic 
representations of these sacred objects in existence, and 
correspond perfectly with the descriptions of Josephus. 
The Jews of Rome even to this day avoid passing under 
the arch which records their enslavement, and a path is 
shown by which they pass around it, to the honor of 
their faithful veneration for their despised faith and fallen 
nation. 

Leaving on your left the great niches of the Temples 
of Venus and Rome, you find yourself again before the 
Coliseum, with leisure to examine it more carefully by 
the light of day. To form to yourself a definite idea of 
it, suppose the oval " Bowling Green" of New York 
made twice as large as it now is. This would represent 
the central area in which the sports and slaughters took 



32 



place. Next, fancy a row of our ordinary-sized houses 
built around this, another row behind them, and so on, 
till the arena is surrounded by the thickness of four 
houses, or a hundred and seventy feet. Pile upon these 
three more quadruple tiers of houses till they reach the 
height of a hundred and sixty feet ; slope down the 
inside of this huge mass of masonry towards the arena, 
like the crater of a volcano, and arrange on it ascending 
rows of seats ; pierce its interior with galleries, arcades, 
vaulted passages, and wide flights of stairs, in which a 
stranger might easily be lost ; convert each tier of 
houses into one gigantic story, each entered and lighted 
by eighty arched openings, divided by columns and 
pilasters ; change the whole material into immense 
blocks of travertine, and you will then have some faint 
notion of the size and appearance of this wonder of the 
world. For centuries it was the quarry from which 
Popes, Nobles, and Plebeians took and stole materials 
for their palaces and houses. The Farnese, the Barbe- 
rini, and the Cancelleria palaces, three of the finest in 
Rome were thus constructed. The siege of Robert 
Guiscard destroyed other portions, and two-thirds of the 
whole original building are thought to have thus disap- 
peared ; what then must it have been in its perfection, 
since such are its ruins ! Even in the eighth century, 
so perfect was it that the Anglo-Saxon pilgrims, identi- 
fying it with the seven-hilled Queen of the world, uttered 
the famous prophecy recorded by the venerable Bede : 



THE COLISEUM. 33 

" While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand ; 
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 
And when Rome falls, the world !" 

The later Popes seem to have felt that their own fate 
was intimately connected with the edifice, and they 
have carefully and judiciously preserved and repaired 
its tottering walls, and sanctified it from future robbe- 
ries by consecrating it to the memory of the crowds of 
Christian martyrs who have perished in the arena. 
Every kiss of the cross in its centre ensures the peni- 
tent faithful an Indulgence from the pains of purgatory 
of a year and two hundred days ; and around the circuit 
are erected fourteen little chapels, containing pictures of 
the " stations" of the progress of Christ from his prison 
to Calvary, before each of which a prayer is to be said. 
The Pontiffs did not consider that this tasteless obtrusion, 
on such a scene, of the symbols of the present religion 
of the city, might sometimes lead the spectator to con- 
trast the modern Romans with their ancestors, and 
perhaps to attribute part of their present degradation to 
the influence of the superstitions which are here so 
palpably thrust upon him. Although the crimes and 
cruelties of the ancient Romans made their fall merited, 
yet their grandeur half excuses their enormity. Even 
now, standing on the topmost arch of the amphitheatre, 
I could almost fancy the circles of marble seats once 
more rising in rows above rows, and crowded by ninety 
thousand of the " fierce democracy" of Rome (who were 

4 



34 ROME. 

always equally clamorous for " bread" and for " games"), 
shielded from sun arid rain by the awnings, of which the 
supports yet remain ; while in the front seats were the 
proud Patricians, arrayed in the glories of conquered 
kingdoms, and before them sat the Emperor, the Sena- 
tors and the Vestal Virgins — all intently gazing on the 
fierce struggles of the wild beasts, brought from the 
farthest extremities of the earth, to delight the even 
wilder passions of this haughty people, who had five 
thousand such slain at the dedication of the edifice — or 
gloating on the murderous contests of the gladiators, who, 
when at last overcome, might look in vain over the vast 
assemblage for a single pitying glance, but see only the 
upturned thumbs, which silently ordered them to be put 
to death — or exulting in the ferocity with which their 
pet lions tore limb from limb the Christian martyrs, men 
and maidens, sacrificed to the Roman thirst for blood. 
But a thousand years have purified the arena, and look- 
ing with the eyes of reality in the place of those of 
fancy, I saw only a procession of veiled nuns, with slow 
steps, pass unmolested through the arena, each in turn 
stopping at the cross in the centre, to say a prayer for 
the souls of the martyred, and to give the kiss which 
secured the promised " Indulgence." The warmest ad- 
mirer of antiquity must confess that the change is much 
for the better, and he may even be reconciled to see 
painted on the outer wall the unromantic characters, " R. 
X. 1208," which indicate that the great Coliseum is 



THE COLISEUM. 35 

known in the registers of modern Rome only as " House 
No. 1208 of the 10th Ward." If it were in America, it 
might receive even a worse desecration, for when a 
New Yorker, now in Rome, a gentleman of high dis- 
tinction as a statesman and a scholar, first entered its 
arena, he exclaimed in ecstacy, as a flood of political 
recollections rushed over his mind, " Good heavens ! 
What a glorious place for a Mass Meeting !" 



36 



III. 



THE CAPITOL. 



At the eastern extremity of the Corso, and overlooking 
the Forum, rises the Capitoline Hill. You ascend it by 
a noble flight of steps, which nothing less than a 
triumphal procession ought ever to mount. On each 
side of their top Castor and Pollux stand on guard beside 
their marble horses. In front you see the Piazza* of 
the modern Capitol, enclosed on three sides by as many 
palaces, designed by Michael Angelo, and displaying in 
its centre the famous equestrian statue, in bronze, of 
Marcus Aurelius, unequalled even yet by any modern 
work. Michael Angelo thought the horse so life-like 
that he once exclaimed to it " Go !" It is under the 
charge of an especial officer, and when Rienzi was 
made Tribune, wine ran from one nostril and water from 
the other. 

The " Palace of the Senator," at the fariher end of 
the square, is surmounted by a tower, whence you get the 

* The word Piazza, which properly means a Place or Square, 
we strangely misapply to a Portico, or Colonnade. 



THE CAPITOL. 37 

best view, and most distinct idea of Rome. In olden 
times the stranger would thence have seen a fruitful 
plain, 

" Divided by a river, of whose banks 
On each side an imperial city stood, 
With towers and temples proudly elevate 
On seven small hills, with palaces adorn'd, 
Porches and theatres, baths, aqueducts, 
Statues and trophies, and triumphal arcs, 
Gardens and groves, presented to his eyes." 

But now you see only the desolate Campagna stripped 
of the towns and villas which once studded it, and 
given up to a few wandering herdsmen, while the seven 
hills under your feet sustain only the degenerate city of 
the Popes, and present only the tottering ruins of the city of 
the Caesars. The Capitol is the dividing point ; north of it 
are the compact masses of the modern habitations, and 
south of it little but fields and vineyards, thinly besprink- 
led with fragments of ancient walls, arches, and temples. 
The palace, from whose tower you now look, is based 
on the massive foundations of the ancient Capitol, but 
how different is its superstructure from that centre of the 
old world, the Temple of the tutelar Gods of the Empire 
city ! It is still the nominal seat of the power of the 
Roman people, but looking down on the Piazza, which 
once was filled 

" By conflux issuing forth or entering in ; 
Praetors ; Proconsuls to their provinces 
4* 



38 ROME. 

Hasting or on return, in robes of state ; 
Lictors, and rods, the ensigns of their power ; 
Legions and cohorts; turms of horse and wings; 
Or embassies from regions far remote ;" 

in their place you now see only a few curious travellers 
like yourself. 

Descending from the Tower (in which half a day 
may be well spent, with map and guide-book, in close 
study of the localities in sight) you should next enter the 
" Palace of the Conservatori," which forms the west side 
of the square. On its ground-floor eight rooms are filled 
with a series of busts of the most illustrious poets, 
painters, sculptors, architects, engineers, and musicians 
of modern Italy, and a native's breast must swell with 
pride when he looks at the long and honorable array. In 
the first room are six busts of eminent foreigners, whose 
genius was considered naturalized by their long residence 
in Rome ; and among them, if his future progress be com- 
mensurate with the rank which he has already attained, 
may hereafter be found the bust of our own sculptor, 
Crawford. In the halls above, the walls of which are 
painted in fresco, with subjects from the history of Rome, 
are various ancient and modern statues, but incomparably 
the most interesting is the famous Bronze Wolf, large as 
life, suckling the infants Romulus and Remus ; faint 
traces of gilding remain upon its sides, and its legs are 
fractured and half-fused, as if by lightning, so that there 
is little doubt that it is the very image commemorated by 



THE CAPITOL. 39 

Cicero, in his third oration against Catiline, as. having 
been struck by a thunderbolt in the ancient Capitol! 
Such coincidences as these are most powerful in trans- 
porting you back to ancient times, almost in body as well 
as in fancy. 

The " Gallery of Pictures" is in the same building, 
and contains four times as many as the Vatican collec- 
tion, but not one-fourth as many good ones. Tintoretto's 
Magdalen has a face like an ugly boy with a pug nose ; 
Albani's " Magdalen" is a bad imitation of the inimitable 
Titian in the Barberigo palace at Venice ; Rubens' 
" Romulus and Remus" is in his coarsest style ; and 
Guido's " Abbozzi" or Sketches for his fine Florentine 
Lucretia and Cleopatra, might well be Englished into 
" Botches." But his " Blessed soul" floating up to Hea- 
ven is the ideal of spiritual beauty ; his " St. Sebastian" 
is more richly colored than the famous one at Dulwich, 
though perhaps less delicately ; and his portrait of him- 
self has a face of holy thought beyond its years, coming 
out from the deep warm shadows in the style of Gior- 
gone. Guer dud's masterpiece has been brought here 
from St. Peter's, where it was replaced by a mosaic 
copy. It nearly covers one end of the room with its 
representation of " Saint Petronilla disentombed and 
shown to Flaccus, a noble Roman, to whom she had been 
espoused." The light of a torch shows her raised by 
two men from her grave, and displays the bridal garland 
still upon her head. Her intended husband stands by 



40 ROME. 

her side in intense grief, and does not seem to see her 
ascending soul received into Heaven by choirs of angels 
who fill the upper part of the picture. The painter has 
committed a pardonable anachronism in making Flaccus 
dry his eyes with a pocket-handkerchief, forgetting that 
the ancient Romans never used such an article. But the 
gem of the collection is Corregio's miniature " Espousal 
of Saint Catherine." The infant Christ is sitting on the 
lap of the Virgin Mary, who instructs him to put the 
betrothal ring on the finger of Saint Catherine. She 
kneels at the feet of the Madonna, and receives the ring 
with a countenance of intense humility and gratitude, 
while the infant playfully turns to look up into his moth- 
er's face with a smile of the most bewitching archness. 
Many of the pictures are specimens of the early schools 
of Art, hard and formal, yet possessing much simple 
sweetness. Most of this class were taken from old 
churches, in which they served as altar-pieces, or as 
decorations, preserving there the semblances of the saints, 
and telling on the walls the stories of sacred history for 
the benefit of the pious unlearned, who could read them 
only when thus narrated in this universal language. 
Others were detached from various articles of ecclesias- 
tical and civil furniture, of which they formed essential 
parts. It is not generally known that it is only within 
the last two or three centuries, that pictures have been 
painted or used as mere ornaments, to be hung on walls, 
and be moved indifferently from place to place, " Cabi- 



THE CAPITOL. 41 

net" pictures, such as now adorn the house of every 
person of taste, are quite modern luxuries. 

In the Palace, on the other side of the square, is the 
" Museum of the Capitol." Its halls are filled, like those 
of the Vatican, with ancient statuary. In the court lies 
the colossal river-god, whom the people made the vehi- 
cle, under the name of Marforio, for their witty replies 
to the satires of Pasquin. In one of the halls on the 
ground floor is a curious funeral altar to " Titus Statilius 
Aper, measurer of the public buildings." On one side 
he is sculptured with a roll of paper in his hand, and a 
child by his side ; and on another are represented his 
implements of trade, his compasses, plummet, and foot 
rule. This is divided into sixteen parts, and by means 
of it we can ascertain the precise length of the Roman 
foot, which was not quite half an inch shorter than the 
English foot, or, more exactly measured, equalled 11.59 
inches. Near it is the tomb of a mason, also with basso- 
relievos of his plumb, rule, square, and level, which last is 
precisely the same as a mason's level of the present day. 

Into the wall of the staircase are inlaid the valuable 
white marble fragments of the plan of Rome, found in 
the Temple of Remus in the Forum. At the end of the 
Great Hall is a hollow cylinder of white marble, adorned 
with basso-relievos of the twelve divinities, but showing 
on its sides marks of cords, which prove, in spite of its 
classic decorations, that it was once only the mouth of 
an ancient well ; for the tasteful spirit of antiquity left 



42 ROME. 

nothing without embellishment, and enabled even the 
" drawer of water" to cultivate his taste and refine his 
mind in the midst of his daily labor. How few such 
provisions does our system of life make for the laborer, 
even when his day's work is over ! 

Near this idealized well-mouth is the Mosaic of Pliny's 
doves, copied in miniature on half the breast-pins that 
you see. The original is about two feet long; the colors 
are very sober and harmonious, and it is surrounded by 
a fanciful mosaic border. It is beyond doubt the iden- 
tical work described by Pliny, as representing " a won- 
derful dove, drinking and darkening the water with the 
shadow of its head, while others are pluming themselves 
and basking on the edge of the vase." 

An adjoining circular temple contains only the grace- 
fully caressing group of " Cupid and Psyche ;" the 
"Leda;" and the " Venus of the Capitol," which is 
nearly in the same position as the Venus de' Medici, 
and almost as beautiful, but larger, and farther distin- 
guished by being supported by an urn covered with dra- 
pery, instead of by a dolphin. It was found very singu- 
larly buried within an old stone wall, on the Via Suburra, 
where it was probably hidden for safety during some 
invasion, in which its owner perished, leaving this 
marble treasure hidden from all the world, till revealed by 
some lucky chance. 

Five grand saloons lie on the other side of the Great 
Hall, and the first of them contains the busts of seventy- 



THE CAPITOL. 43 

six Emperors and Empresses, arranged in chronological 
order, from Julius Caesar to Julian the Apostate, and pre- 
senting a most valuable series of authentic portraits of 
these remarkable personages of history. In the next 
rooms are an equal number of ancient philosophers, 
orators, and poets, and among them are three of Socrates, 
all agreeing in making him the ugliest man ever lived ; 
except, perhaps, Lord Brougham, whom he somewhat 
resembles in physiognomy. Next comes the central 
saloon, one statue in which wears the toga in such a 
manner as to show that the modern Romans have inhe- 
rited from antiquity their graceful way of throwing their 
inseparable cloaks over their shoulders. To this suc- 
ceeds the " Hall of the Faun," so named from a figure in 
" rosso anticoP In it is the " Tablet of Bronze," from 
which Rienzi expounded to his followers the powers of 
the Roman people. Near by is the Antinous, insipidly 
beautiful ; and a graceful girl sheltering in her arms a 
dove which she seems to have just saved from a serpent 
which rears up its head at her feet ; a group probably 
copied by the sculptor from an actual incident. 

In the last room is the " Dying Gladiator," the most 
powerfully impressive of all sculpture, ancient or modern. 
The other great statues of antiquity, such as the Apollo Bel- 
videre,the Venus, and the Antinous,have little or no feeling 
or expression to call forth our sympathy ; they are entirely 
objective, and seem, like the poetry of Homer, completely 
absorbed in outward action, and incapable of introspection. 



44 ROME. 

But the Gladiator appeals to the kindliest feelings of our 
heart as a man and a brother, and as his life-blood oozes 
out, he demands our sympathy for his " young barbarians 
all at play" by the far Danube, and "their Dacian 
mother," while he is " butchered to make a Roman holi- 
day." But we must confess that we might never have 
fancied half of this, if Byron had not so vividly embo- 
died our dim gropings of thought. His description, how- 
ever, of the mere reality before us, apart from the mov- 
ing association with which he invests it, has the graphic 
fidelity of a Daguerreotype. 

" I see before me the Gladiator lie : 

He leans upon his hand — his manly brow 
Consents to death, but conquers agony, 
And his droop'd head sinks gradually low, 
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow 
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one, 
Like the first of a thunder shower ; and now 
The arena swims around him — he is gone, 
Ere ceas'd the inhuman shout which hail'd the wretch who won." 



45 



IV. 

CHURCHES, IMAGES, RELIQUES AND MIRACLES. 

The readers of travels in Italy become heartily tired 
of the Churches, which are so often commended to their 
admiration, but they should charitably call to mind that 
these edifices constitute a very large proportion of the 
intellectual food of the traveller. Little would need be said 
of them, if they were such bare and tasteless barns as are 
too many of the houses of worship in America, but in 
Italy the highest genius of the best architects, sculptors 
and painters, has lavished on them centuries of its poetic 
labors. Kings have left their own palaces unfinished, 
and devoted their revenues to adorn the abode of the 
King of kings. The finest minds of the nation have left 
their impress on these shrines of magnificence ; the 
noblest conceptions of the architect — that poet in stone — 
have been here embodied ; the painter has summoned 
his highest skill when called upon to represent some 
touching event in sacred history for the instruction and 
improvement of the unlearned devout ; the sculptor has 
here left his master-pieces in the statues of the great men 



46 ROME. 

— heroes, divines, and poets — who lie beneath the mar- 
ble pavement ; and every Church thus becomes an inter- 
esting volume in the history of the past, recording the 
great deeds of mind as well as of body. 

The Churches of all Catholic countries are generally 
in the form of a cross. At the extreme end is the high 
altar, and along the sides are ranged smaller ones 
(dedicated to various Saints), over each of which hangs 
a sacred picture, oftentimes a master-piece of art. No 
pews or benches encumber the marble pavement, but a 
few chairs are clustered before the altars. The Churches 
are never closed against worshippers, and enter them at 
what hour you may, you will always find some devotees 
kneeling before their favorite altars, and seemingly 
absorbed in their prayers. They are generally old 
women of the poorer class — for those who find little 
enjoyment in this world naturally seek for it in another — 
but at high mass ladies of the highest wealth and birth 
kneel on the pavement beside the beggar ; and at other 
times a fierce-looking man is often seen prostrating him- 
self on the altar steps, and apparently repenting most 
sincerely of some great crime. 

Most of the Churches of Rome are also famous for 
some wonder-working images or reliques, though they 
are now retained, rather by the sufferance than with the 
approval of the higher orders of the clergy, as visible 
incentives to the devotion of the common people, who 
could not appreciate more spiritual appeals. One of the 



CHURCHES. 47 

most favorite images is a miraculous wooden figure of the 
Madonna with the Child, which is preserved in the Church 
of San Agostino. Prints of it are hung up in most houses 
in Rome, and before leaving the city I found that the 
pious care of my landlady had placed one of them under 
my bed, to preserve me from evil spirits and all other 
dangers, and she firmly believed that I was indebted to 
it for my escape from malaria and assassination. The 
original image stands in a niche beside the high altar, 
and crowds of men, women and children, are always 
kneeling before it, and eagerly kissing its toe, as they do 
that of the bronze Saint Peter. Not only its shrine, but 
also the adjoining pillars and walls, are covered with 
votive offerings, presented by the pious, who believe that 
they have been saved from disease and death by the 
Madonna's interposition. Hundreds have hung up wax 
hearts, arms, legs, &c, in gratitude for wonderful cures. 
Rude pictures are added, in one of which a carriage is 
seen overturned, while the Yirgin peeps out from the 
clouds and rescues the passengers ; in another is repre- 
sented a storm at sea ; and in a third, the lightning 
strikes a tree, under which is seen he who now thus 
returns thanks for escaping unhurt. Crutches are there, 
which the cripple has deposited in proof of his miracu- 
lous cure. In one corner stands an old gun given up by 
a reformed bandit. Many precious stones glitter on the 
walls, presented to the Virgin to secure her intercession. 
A nobleman, who had been robbed of some rich family 



48 ROME. 

jewels, lately recognized some of them among those offer- 
ed at this shrine, where the thief had hung them up, to 
compound with his conscience by giving part of his plun- 
der to the Madonna, and thus making her go shares. The 
nobleman obtained an order from the Pope, that the jew- 
els should be restored to him ; but the priest, under whose 
charge they were, refused to touch them, saying, " You 
are at liberty to take them yourself, for I cannot oppose 
the order of the Holy Father, but I will have nothing to 
do with it, and I warn you that I will not ensure you 
against the wrath of the Madonna." This menace so 
terrified the nobleman, that he did not dare to take his 
own property from the holy walls, and there his jewels 
still remain. 

Another curious illustration of superstition is found in 
the adjoining street, della Scrofa. An Italian friend 
pointed out to me there an image of the Virgin, with a 
lighted lamp before it, attached to the topmost chimney 
of a high house. Many years ago a pet monkey had 
carried a new-born infant up to that dizzy height, and 
begun to toss it up and play with it, at the imminent risk 
of dropping it from his arms to the pavement of the street. 
He could not be enticed down, and no one dared to ap- 
proach him lest they should precipitate the catastrophe. 
At last the frantic mother vowed this image to the Vir- 
gin, and immediately the monkey, moved by the special 
interposition of the Madonna (or sated with his sport), 
brought down the child unhurt, and gave it up to its 



49 



mother, who punctually fulfilled her vow, and still nightly 
lights the lamp before the image. 

In the Corso you find the Church of Santa Maria in 
Via Lata, which is said to occupy the spot where St. 
Paul lodged with the Centurion, and in a vault beneath, 
you are shown a spring which miraculously leaped up 
to supply the Apostle with water to baptize his converts. 

Some curious reliques are preserved in the Church of 
St. John Lateran, founded by the Emperor Constantine 
himself, and styled in an inscription over its door, 
" Mother and head of all the churches of the city and 
the world." Its noble interior is divided by four rows of 
piers into five aisles, and on each side of the central one 
are arranged, with most imposing effect, colossal statues 
of the twelve Apostles. In a tabernacle over the high 
altar are the unquestioned heads of St. Peter and St. 
Paul. In a side room I was shown a piece of the table 
on which the " Last Supper " was eaten. It seems to 
be a piece of red cedar, about a yard square, and was 
formerly covered with plates of silver ; but the barbari- 
ans stripped off the precious metal, and have left only a 
few fragments of it adhering to the nails. The cloisters 
are surrounded by a series of small Lombard arches, 
supported by double columns of all shapes, twisted, 
carved and inlaid with mosaics. Among the treasures 
there preserved is " A column of the Temple of Jeru- 
salem," split in two by the same earthquake which 
" rent the veil of the Temple in twain." It is a small 
5* 



50 ROME. 

round column of white marble, covered with carvings, 
and split longitudinally into two equal parts with a pre- 
cision which it is really difficult to explain. Near it is a 
square slab of red porphyry, said to be the stone on which 
the soldiers cast lots for the garments of Christ. It bears 
the inscription, " Et super vestem meam miserunt sortem." 
Beside it are two columns of Pilate's house. A little 
farther on you see a marble slab supported on four pillars 
at precisely the height of the stature of Christ, which, 
according to this standard, was exactly six feet. In 
another place is the Altar which was the scene of the 
Miracle of Bolsena, commemorated by Raphael on the 
walls of the Vatican. The legend states that a scepti- 
cal priest, while celebrating mass, dared to doubt the 
miracle of transubstantiation. Instantaneously the holy 
wafer leaped from his hands, passed through the marble 
top of this altar, making a hole which is still there, and 
struck against its side, leaving a stain of blood which is 
yet visible and is protected by an iron grating. What 
could be more convincing ? The monk who showed me 
this relique was perfectly well assured of the miracle, 
though he was too conscientious to vouch for the truth of 
the tradition which stated a marble well-mouth, standing 
in the centre of the cloisters, to be " The well of the 
woman of Samaria." 

Opposite to St. John Later an is La Scala Santa, the 
Holy Staircase, consisting of twenty-eight marble steps, 



RELIQUES. 51 

believed to have belonged to the house of Pilate, and to 
be the very ones which Christ descended when he left the 
judgment-seat. So sacred is it esteemed that none are 
allowed to ascend it, except penitents on their knees, and 
an inscription promises to whomsoever thus mounts to its 
top, devoutly meditating on the Passion, &c, " an Indul- 
gence of nine years for each step ;" so that all the steps 
will procure for the penitent a respite of 252 years 
from the pains of purgatory. I always found a greater 
or less number of men and women painfully climbing it 
on their knees, and many seemed utterly exhausted with 
fatigue when they had reached the top. So great is the 
concourse that the steps would be worn out by penitent 
knees, if they were not covered with planks, which have 
been three times renewed. On each side of these steps 
are two other flights, which the penitents descend after 
accomplishing their penance, and which heretics, like 
myself, are allowed to mount. A young English clergy- 
man, with whom I first visited the place, had the bad 
taste, in his Protestant bigotry, to attempt to walk up the 
" Scala Santa," but the outcries of the insulted people 
stopped him on the first step, and he was lucky in not 
being torn to pieces. The chapel at the summit con- 
tains a portrait by St. Luke, of Jesus at the age of twelve 
years, and an inscription says, " There is no more holy 
place in all the world." 

Not far distant is the Church of Santa Croce in Geru- 
salemme. It is so named from the earth of Jerusalem 



52 



scattered on its foundation, and from a piece of the true 
cross which it contains ; though it is said that enough of 
this latter relique is extant, in various depositaries, to build 
a ship of the line. 

There are two subterraneous chapels. In that of St. 
Gregory, on the left, " every mass celebrated frees a 
soul from purgatory." If this be indeed so, they ought, 
in Christian charity, to keep busy day and night in the 
good work. The chapel, on the right, is dedicated to 
St. Helena, but is inscribed, " Women cannot enter this 
holy chapel under the penalty of excommunication. '' And 
this exclusion exists in a place sacred to a woman ! It 
must be a remnant of that old Pagan doctrine of the infe- 
riority of the female sex, which is not yet shaken off by 
the Mahommedans, nor, as it here appears, by the 
Roman Catholics. 

In the upper church is a list of the Reliques, from 
which I translate literally the following : 

" Three pieces of the wood of the Cross." 

" The inscription over the Cross in Hebrew, Greek and Latin." 

" One of the nails of the Cross." 

" A thorn from the Crown of Thorns." 

" The finger with which St. Thomas touched Christ." 

" The cross-piece of the Cross of the good thief" 

" One of the pieces of money paid to Judas" 

In the chapel of St. Helena are, 

" The veil and the hair of the Virgin Mary." 
" The cord which bound Christ." 



RELIQUES. 53 

" The sponge filled with gall and vinegar." 

" The ashes of S. Lorenzo Martyr, made into a cake with 

his blood." 
" Some earth from Calvary, wet with the blood of Christ." 
" A piece of the stone on which God wrote the laws of Moses " 

Beside these specialties, an immense quantity of skulls, 
bones, teeth, &c, of various saints and martyrs, are 
preserved on sloping shelves, in glass cases, and carefully 
labelled, like specimens of minerals in a Museum. 

Democritus would laugh at all these things, but Hera- 
clitus would weep, and we travel to very little purpose if 
we do not learn charity to every sincere belief, however 
absurd it may seem to us ; remembering that our own may 
seem equally so to a more enlightened order of beings. 

The Church of Santa Maria d'Ara Cadi is perched on 
the eastern peak of the Capitoline hill. My guide-book 
(the invaluable Murray's, to which I desire to record my 
constant obligations) informed me that it was venerated 
as the depositary of a miraculous wooden image of the 
Saviour — II sanlissimo Bambino — " carved by a Fran- 
ciscan pilgrim, out of a tree which grew on the Mount 
of Olives, and painted by St. Luke while the pilgrim was 
sleeping over his work." It is famous for its wonderful 
power in healing the sick of all diseases. I mounted to 
the Church by its hundred and twenty -four steps of Gre- 
cian marble (stolen from the Temple of Venus and 
Rome), but did not find the Bambino in any of the 
chapels. On inquiring for it of a priest who was passing 



54 ROME. 

by, he took me through the sacristy into a private chapel, 
at the end of which was a wooden closet like a ward- 
robe. He knelt before it, muttering a brief prayer, and 
then rose and began to don his priestly vestments, his 
cope edged with lace, his purple sash and the rest. I 
found that my sight-hunting curiosity had entangled me 
in somewhat of a scene, but I resolved to see it out. 
When the priest was robed, he opened the closet doors 
and discovered a velvet-covered coffer, on each side of 
which stood figures of Joseph and the Virgin Mary. 
Two or three men who had followed me in, now dropped 
on their knees, and I went down upon one. The priest 
set two lighted candles on each side of the coffer, and 
then unrolled from it covering after covering, till at last 
he came down to the Bambino itself, enveloped in swad- 
dling-clothes of white satin, which were almost covered 
with jewels, — diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and the like, — 
perfectly dazzling as they flashed in the light. All of 
them had been presented to the Bambino by his grateful 
votaries, who attributed their recovery from sickness to 
his miraculous powers. The Royal jewels of Great 
Britain do not equal the splendor here displayed. The 
face of the Bambino was coarsely carved and colored in 
the style of a ship's figure-head, and did not do much 
credit to St. Luke's skill as an artist. A dozen strings 
of large pearls hung around the neck, and the gems were 
attached to the white satin which covered every other 
part except the feet. The priest knelt before it, and re- 



MIRACLES. 55 

peated several prayers in which all joined, and then, 
carefully taking the image on the ends of his ringers, he 
suddenly, to my startling surprise, pressed its toes to my 
forehead, and then to my lips ! I bore the unexpected 
honor as meekly as possible, and he afterwards presented 
the image to the other visitors, who kissed it most eagerly 
and reverentially. He then returned it to its place, care- 
fully wrapped it up, blew out the candles, and waited to 
receive " something for charity." 

On returning home and telling my landlady that I had 
kissed the toe of II santissimo Bambino, she exclaimed 
that I was most fortunate, and that now I was sure to 
enjoy perfect health and prosperity as long as I remained 
in Rome. When I laughed at this assurance, to over- 
come my incredulity, she told me a story of a miracle 
performed by it in the time of her grandmother. " The 
Holy Bambino had been carried to the house of a lady 
who was very ill, and was left with her a day to restore 
her to health. The lady was, however, secretly an un- 
believer, and she hid away the Bambino, and made an 
exact imitation of it, which she gave to the priests when 
they came for it. They carried this false image to the 
church without any suspicion of the fraud. But the 
Holy Bambino would not stay with the wicked lady. In 
the night it got up, walked to the church and knocked at 
the door — pit-pat — with its little feet. « Chi e V ' Who 
is there V called the priest. It knocked again with its 



56 ROME. 

little feet — pit-pat — and when the priest opened the door, 
there he found II santissimo Bambino /" 

So ran the story told me, and such are the supersti- 
tions of the vulgar ; but I ought to add, in justice to 
Roman Catholics of education, that an intelligent Jesuit, 
with whom I afterwards became acquainted, and to whom 
I repeated the story, laughed at it most heartily, and 
when I asked him with surprise if he did not believe in 
the miracle, he replied, " Certainly not, no more than you 
do." He added, in answer to my inquiries, that any 
person might sincerely disbelieve even a received mira- 
cle (such as the liquefaction of the blood of Saint Janua- 
rius at Naples), and still be a good Catholic, for he might 
think that the effect was produced by natural and physi- 
cal causes ; but, if he went about saying that it was an 
imposture of the priests, he would bring religion itself 
into contempt, and therein he would sin deeply. The 
subtlety of this distinction is worthy of a Jesuit. 



57 



A DAY AMONG THE TOMBS OF ROME. 

" Man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes and pom- 
pous in the grave," and most splendid and pompous of all 
mankind were the ancient Romans. Their Emperors 
raised gigantic Mausolea, which two thousand years have 
not been able to destroy ; a wealthy Roman's wife has 
for her sepulchre " a stern round tower, firm as a for- 
tress ;" and even an humble baker's tomb still remains, 
sculptured with the emblems of his trade. Few persons 
were allowed the honor of being buried within the city, 
but their tombs lined the sides of the great roads beyond 
the gates, and made them " streets of sepulchres," where 
his ancestors saluted the Roman as he left or entered the 
city. The most celebrated were beside the Appian way, 
and there we still find the Sepulchre of Scipio. It is a 
labyrinth of winding passages, cut in the soft tufa rock, 
and branching to right and left, with recesses here and 
there, where once lay the bodies of the dead for whom it 
was excavated. But 

" The Scipios' tombs contain no ashes now ; 
The very sepulchres lie tenantless 
Of their heroic dwellers." 
6 



58 ROME. 

All have been dug up to gratify our Gothic curiosity, and 
at the end of the subterraneous labyrinth, which you 
thread with taper in hand, following close on the heels of 
a beldame guide, shrivelled and haggard as one of the 
Parcce, you now find only the empty chamber which con- 
tained the well-known Sarcophagus of Scipio before it 
was removed to the Vatican. 

Emerging to day-light from this sacrilegious ransacking 
of the kingdom of the dead, you cross a vineyard to a 
Columbarium, or family-vault. It is a stone chamber, 
twenty-five feet square, and as many high, into which 
you descend by steep stone steps. In all the four inner 
walls are rows of semi-circular openings, like so many 
small oven-mouths or pigeon-holes; from their resemblance 
to which last comes the name. They look somewhat 
like the above-ground graves in the New Orleans ceme- 
tery, except that the latter are much larger to receive 
entire bodies, while in the niches of the Columbarium 
are inserted only small urns containing the ashes and 
burnt bones of the deceased. Above each is a marble 
slab, with a brief inscription to the memory of its occu- 
pant. Nine tiers of these run around the walls, and in 
the centre of the chamber is erected a square mass of 
masonry, which is also pierced with niches, so that the 
remains, which were once five hundred Romans, are 
accommodated with " ample room and verge enough " 
within half the space of an ordinary modern house. 

Many minor tombs, now mere nameless masses of 



THE TOMBS OF ROME. 59 

brick-work, line the sides of the Appian way ; but you 
hurry by them to reach that of Cecilia Metella. It is a 
massive circular tower, which seems built for eternity, 
with its walls twenty-five feet thick, formed of huge 
blocks of travertine, and enclosing within its narrow 
chamber only " a woman's grave !" You enter through 
a breach in the walls, and look down into the circular 
cavity, now despoiled of the treasure which its builder 
fondly hoped would remain for ever in its safe keeping. 
The sarcophagus, which was its sole tenant, now stands 
in a corner of the court-yard of the Farnese Palace, and 
the rain is permitted to beat upon its fluted sides of white 
Parian marble, which were once so carefully shielded 
from even the winds of heaven visiting them too roughly, 
while, through a hole broken in it, the lowest reptile may 
crawl over the sacred ashes ! We know nothing of 
Cecilia Metella, except from this gigantic proof of her 
husband's " love or pride ;" but a little more regard might 
have been paid to the common feelings of humanity, and 
to the golden maxim of doing as one would be done by, 
though much could not be expected from this utilitarian 
age, in which " Mizraim cureth wounds, and Pharaoh is 
sold for balsam." 

The entrance to the ancient Christian Catacombs is 
from the church of St. Sebastian, also on the Appian 
way. Guided by an old monk, and each of us carrying 
a tall wax candle, we descended a long flight of steps, 
and entered a series of winding passages, roughly cut in 



60 ROME. 

the soft rock, just high and wide enough for a man to 
pass through. Their extent is almost incredible ; one 
passage is shown which extends to Ostia, sixteen miles 
distant, and they are said to be sixty miles in circuit. 
When, or for what purpose, these immense galleries were 
first excavated, is uncertain (though probably to obtain 
pozzolana), but their gloomy and lonely caverns were 
used by the early Christians in the times of their perse- 
cutions, to secretly hold forbidden meetings, to celebrate 
their holy mysteries at the peril of their lives, and to 
deposit the remains of their martyred brethren. In some 
recesses are shown their altars, with the roof above yet 
blackened with the smoke of their lamps ; and along the 
walls of the passages are hewn out hollows, just large 
enough for the bodies which they contained. In one 
spot are two large recesses and five smaller ones, in 
which, according to an inscription above, were contained 
an entire family of father, mother, and five children. 
There are said to have been here found the bodies of 
one hundred and seventy-four thousand martyrs, and forty- 
six Popes, most of whom have been removed to separate 
shrines. The passages which contained them are so 
countless and winding, that visitors have sometimes 
entered alone, and never again found their way out ; and 
to guard against a recurrence of these disasters, most of 
the galleries are now stopped up ; but still some of our 
party had some misgivings, as they blindly followed the 
monk in his windings and branchings from passage to 



THE TOMBS OF ROME. 61 

passage, and they were much relieved when we at 
length ascended to the church by another entrance, the 
original one trodden by the early Christians. 

In this sanctuary is the highly-prized relique of a 
stone, on which are two foot-shaped hollows, which are 
believed to be the miraculous impressions made by the 
feet of Christ, when he was met by St. Peter at the spot 
now occupied by the little church of Domine-quo-vadis, 
which was built to commemorate the event, and named 
from the words uttered by St. Peter. The stone has 
been long devoutly venerated, but a lynx-eyed sculptor 
lately visited it, and discovered that the marks are those 
of two right feet ! 

Re-entering the city, at its farther end we find the 
Mausoleum of Augustus, which was a circular building 
of white marble, constructed by the Emperor himself, 
two hundred feet in diameter, covered with hanging gar- 
dens, and containing in its inner circumference sepulchral 
chambers for the remains of his family and friends, the 
first among whom was the young Marcellus, " miserande 
puer." There is something grand in the spectacle of 
the master of the world, who could command all the 
enjoyments and triumphs of life, not fearing to prepare 
his own sepulchre. But at the present day this Mauso- 
leum of the Emperor who gave his name to the most 
glorious era in the history of the world, is degraded into 
a Circus, and a marble tablet in its corridor commemo- 
rates, not Augustus, but a rope dancer and elephant 
6* 



62 ROME. 

keeper, whose marvellous abilities " drew unheard-of 
concourse and applause !" 

" The Mole which Hadrian reared on high " we saw, 
on our way to Saint Peter's, converted into the Castle of 
St. Angelo. The Archangel Michael, whose image 
crowns it and gives it its name, was seen by Pope Gre- 
gory the Great, in the sixth century, hovering over it. 
It supplied a happy answer to a French officer who 
commanded the fortress in the war of the revolution, and 
who replied to the Neapolitan troops who besieged him 
in it, that he would surrender when the bronze angel 
above had sheathed his sword. 

From the sublime mausolea of Emperors let us step to 
the ridiculous tomb of the Baker Eurysaces and his wife, 
which has been lately discovered just outside of the 
Porta Maggiore. It is a building of three stories, the 
second of which is composed of an upright row of the 
stone mortars in which bakers used to knead their bread, 
and in the third of which similar mortars lie on their 
sides, with their mouths facing you, and holding a stone 
ball to represent the dough. Around the top runs a row 
of round loaves. On the frieze are sculptured the dif- 
ferent stages of making bread, and in front is a basso- 
relievo representing the baker and his wife, with a 
sarcophagus and an inscription, " Atistia, my wife, was a 
most excellent woman, and all that is left of her body is 
in this bread-basket" The whole monument, to our 
notion, seems a curious jesting with the grave, but it 



THE TOMBS OF ROME. 63 

shows that the bakers of those days were not above their 
business. 

In a corner of the church " Santa Maria del Popolo," 
I discovered a very curious monument of more modern 
times. At its bottom the upper half of a skeleton, with 
its hands crossed on its breast, is sculptured out of bone- 
colored marble, and half covered with a white marble 
shroud ; at its top is a portrait of the man there buried, 
with the motto, " This is not alive," and under the skele- 
ton is another motto, " Nor is this dead." The inscrip- 
tion states that both were executed by their subject, 
" Joannes Baptista Gislenus, of Rome, architect to two 
kings of Poland," in 1670, when he was 70 years old, 
and two years before he died. Below the inscription are 
two medallions, one of a Phoenix on its funeral pile, 
with the motto, " I will die in my nest," and the other of 
a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, with the motto, 
" Like the Phcenix will I multiply my days." The 
epitaph concludes with saying, " I ask from thee neither 
applause nor compassion, but only a salutation when you 
enter, and a farewell when you depart." The whole 
monument is a very singular memento of the taste of the 
seventeenth century. 

The Cemetery of the Capuchin Monks is one of the 
most striking sights in Rome. You first enter their 
church (which contains Guido's magnificent picture of 
the archangel Michael, " severe in youthful beauty," 
trampling Satan under his feet), and there find a monk to 



64 ROME. 

conduct you. You descend in the rear of the church, 
and enter a narrow hall, from which open out five low 
vaulted chambers, filled with the bones of all the monks 
who have died there since the foundation of the church. 
The roofs and walls of the chambers are covered with 
skulls, ribs, legs, arms, and fingers, arranged in the 
most fantastic forms, like the weapons in the Tower of 
London. You see them formed into pyramids, arches, 
stars, suns, crowns, festoons, and even chandeliers, all 
made of bones. Among these ornaments stand some 
perfect skeletons, with sandals on their fleshless feet, 
rosaries in their bony hands, and the brown cloak of the 
order thrown over all, while from under its hood their 
skulls grin horribly a ghastly smile. On the floor of 
these chambers are two rows of graves, with the names 
of their occupants inscribed on the wooden crosses 
which are stuck in them. Each new occupant displaces 
a previous one, whose skeleton is then placed erect against 
the side. The last date was only two months old, and I 
asked the monk who was my guide, how he would like such 
treatment when his turn came 1 " Oh, that will be some 
time yet," he replied. " But the last one was as young 
as you." " Yes, but he was always sickly." Females 
are not allowed to enter the monastery, except on a 
certain day in the year, when all who come and pray in 
the chapel before sunrise obtain plenary indulgence for 
all their sins. " Once there was a side door by which 
females could look in, but it was stopped up," said the 



THE TOMBS OF ROME. 65 

monk, "because the women used to start and scream, 
and make a noise, for they are not like men, who come 
and look, and then go away and reflect." He enlighten- 
ed me on the difference between Capuchin and Francis- 
can monks ; the former must go barefoot, wear no shirt, 
and sleep on a board ; the latter enjoy sandals, shirts, 
and mattresses. The monks here were originally Capu- 
chins, but begged one indulgence after another, till now 
they have become Franciscans. " But even yet," con- 
tinued my cunning monk, " we are kept very strictly ; so, 
if you, Signore, were to offer me a handkerchief, or a 
piece of money, T could not take it, without a permission 
from the Superior, which permission I have received." I 
took the hint, gave him his fee, and bade him adieu. 

The Protestant burial-ground is particularly interesting 
to the stranger in Rome, for he does not know how soon 
he himself may enjoy a corner of it, and, in the words of 
Shelley, " it might make one in love with death, to think 
that one should be buried in so sweet a place." It lies 
under the mouldering walls and towers of ancient Rome, 
in the shadow of the pyramid which is the tomb of Caius 
Cestius, 

" And like an infant's smile, over the dead, 
A light of laughing flowers along the grass is spread." 

Beneath its cypresses is buried the poet Keats, upon 
whose tomb is engraved, according to his last wish — 
" Here lies one whose name was writ in water." On the 



66 ROME. 

summit of the rising ground, with Imperial Rome at his 
feet, are the remains of Shelley, beneath a broad slab, 
overhung with roses m mid-winter, and inscribed, 
" Percy Bysshe Shelley, Cor Cordium" — " heart of 
hearts," in every sense, but so commemorated here from 
the strange fact, that when his body was burnt on the 
coast of the gulf of Spezzia, where the waves had cast 
it ashore, his noble heart remained unconsumed. 

In such a ramble as we have taken to-day among the 
sepulchres of two thousand years, the mind is naturally 
led to contrast the ancient and modern modes of disposing 
of their dead ; and the more frequently that we find the 
foul churchyards of our own days brought into compari- 
son with the funeral piles and the urn-burial of antiquity, 
the more inclined do we feel to exclaim, in despite of the 
shackles of custom — 

Entomb me not, when life shall pass away, 

In the dark earth j though leaf, and flower, and tree 
Might blossom o'er my grave, let me not be 
Of adder, toad, and worm the helpless prey : 
Nor vainly strive to save me from decay 
In spicy cerements, hideous mockery 
Of former life, which once-fond friends would see, 
And shrinking, half-suppressed disgust betray : 
But give my corse to purifying fire, 

And let the quivering blaze in air ascend, 
Fit emblem of th' ethereal soul, which, higher 

And nobler yet, to heaven will eager tend , 
And to celestial happiness aspire, 

When thus in flame its earthly course shall end. 



67 



VI. 



THE VATICAN. 



By the side of Saint Peter's stands the Vatican 
Palace ; and it is a worthy companion to the great Cathe- 
dral, not so much for its architecture, or its extent, 
(though it contains more than four thousand rooms, and 
two hundred staircases, and covers more than twenty 
acres of ground), as for its unparalleled collections of 
sculpture and painting. The statues from Greece and 
ancient Rome — the antique sarcophagi, vases, candelabra, 
altars and inscriptions — the paintings of " the divine Ra- 
phael," and the like — here fill galleries, saloons, halls and 
temples, worthy of the priceless treasures, and have all 
been collected into this focus of splendor by the liberality 
and taste of successive Popes, who have thus made the 
Vatican even more famous as a metropolis of art, than it 
was in former days as the spiritual forge from which 
were fulminated the terrible bulls against heresies and 
insubordination, which " with fear of change perplexed 
monarchs." 

My first visit to the Vatican was made by torch-light, 
and those who desire striking first impressions should not 



68 ROME. 

fail to do likewise, though the present Pope has so great 
fears of fire, that he throws every difficulty in the way 
of such visits, harassing them by many precise restric- 
tions ; and when they do take place, he sits by his window 
watching the galleries till every light is extinguished. 
On the appointed evening, an hour after sunset, we met, 
to the required number of fifteen (neither more nor less 
being allowed), at the foot of the great staircase of the 
Palace. Here the Swiss guards of the Pope were in 
attendance, and the Major-Domo counted us carefully, 
and then marshalled the way. We followed him up the 
broad flights of marble steps, the grandest in the world, 
and through various saloons, dusky from their half-lighted 
vastness, till we reached the great, hall. Here a number 
of wax candles were placed in a shade, which hid the 
light from our eyes, and threw it on the objects in 
advance. The guide carried this light at the end of a 
long staff, and walked ahead, stopping before the most 
remarkable statues, while we followed at a little distance, 
guarded by the soldiers, and awed into silence by the 
grandeur around us. Criticism was forgotten in admira- 
tion. The first gallery is over a thousand feet long, 
and is lined on both sides with marble statues of gods, 
heroes, emperors, philosophers, and the other imagina- 
tions or realities of antiquity. As the torch advanced up 
the long perspective with its marble population, the effect 
was indescribably magnificent. The statues seemed to 
step forward to meet us as the light fell xvpon one after 



THE VATICAN. 69 

the other. In the distance all was dim obscurity, but the 
advancing torch peopled every corner, flashing on statue 
after statue, as if they were just rising from the floor, or 
leaping from the walls. Their combinations might sup- 
ply even a Dante with new ideas. The changing 
shadows gave life and expression to the marble features ; 
Jupiter frowned ; Venus smiled ; Demosthenes and 
Cicero became silently eloquent ; the Apollo Belvedere 
exulted over his sped arrow ; and Laocoon seemed to be 
really writhing in the coils of the serpent. Many of 
these sculptures were originally designed for baths and 
other subterranean chambers, where they could be seen 
only by artificial illumination, and the light of day is too 
harsh for the contours, which, by torch-light, receive a 
warmth and softness which change the marble into flesh. 
For two hours we walked on through halls, saloons, and 
courts, filled with statuary, almost realizing the Arabian 
fable of the city, whose inhabitants had all been changed 
to stone ; and when we finished the circuit, the guard 
counted us over again, as if he suspected that some of us 
would have liked to hide in a corner, and pass the night 
in studying the statues by the light of the moon, which 
was gushing in through the windows, and struggling 
with our torch. 

Many successive days were passed in minute examina- 
tion of the collections, but though our admiration of many 
single objects was greatly increased by their more careful 
study, yet the general impression by daylight was far 



70 ROME. 

inferior to the striking one of that night, which ought to 
be the only visit, if the stranger were content to admire 
without discriminating. The Vatican is open to the pub- 
lic on Mondays and Thursdays from twenty to twenty- 
three o'clock, as the Romans begin to reckon from the 
Ave Maria, or half an hour after sunset, and count on for 
twenty -four successive hours. In December, therefore, the 
hours of opening are from one to four, and the transient 
visitor to Rome should give all these afternoons to the 
Vatican. 

The long colonnade and staircases by which it is en- 
tered, are ingeniously contrived by the architect, Bernini, 
to appear even longer than they really are (though the 
great reality needed no such exaggerations), for he has 
made the farther end gradually contract in width, and the 
spectator naturally attributes the diminution of size to 
the effect of the perspective, and is surprised at the great 
length which he thinks could alone have produced so 
remarkable an effect. At the top of the long flight of 
steps, decorated with Ionic columns, you turn to the 
right, and ascend another, which leads you into the 
Royal Saloon, from which open on one side the far- 
famed Sistine Chapel (to which we will return another 
day), and on the other, the Pauline Chapel, which on the 
day of my first visit was open for the " Exposition of the 
Holy Sacrament." The altar was in a blaze of light, 
from hundreds of wax tapers in golden candlesticks, 
arranged in crosses, festoons, and other figures, and the 



THE VATICAN. 71 

floor was crowded with devotees, kneeling and praying 
most earnestly, and always, before leaving, bowing three 
times to the sacred emblems. There were no officiating 
priests, and not a sound was heard but the rustle of the 
clothes of those entering and retiring, and the faint mur- 
murs of the penitents. 

Leaving the chapel and passing through the Ducal Sa- 
loon, you walk along an open portico, by the side of a 
court, and enter the first hall of sculpture, the Galleria 
Lapidaria, nearly a quarter of a mile in length. Its first 
division is occupied chiefly with sepulchral monuments. 
On the sides are stone coffins (covered with sculptures, 
usually of gay and festive subjects in the true spirit of 
the ancient pbilosophy), funeral altars, and tomb-stones, 
one of which represents a cutler's shop and forge, in 
token of the trade of Lucius Atemetus, who was buried 
beneath it. Upon the walls are displayed ancient se- 
pulchral inscriptions in Greek and Latin. The Pagan 
are on the right hand, and on the left are the early Chris- 
tian ones found in the Catacombs, where they secretly 
celebrated their rites and buried their dead ; and it is 
remarked how " the influence of a purer creed is appa- 
rent in the constant reference to the state beyond the 
grave, which contrasts in a striking manner with the 
hopeless grief expressed in the Roman monuments." 

The next division, the Museo Chiaramonti, forming 
part of the same gallery, was formed by Pope Pius VII. 
and arranged by Canova. Of the seven hundred pieces 



72 



of sculpture which it alone contains, all of more or less 
interest, only a very few can be here even alluded to. 
A bust of the Emperor Augustus at the age of about six- 
teen, is exquisitely beautiful, and is farther remarkable 
for bearing so striking a likeness to Napoleon in his best 
days, as to impress every one who sees it. The coin- 
cidence must have been gratifying to the modern Em- 
peror, when he entered these halls as a conqueror. The 
celebrated sitting statue of Tiberius alone cost twelve 
thousand dollars. The sleeping fisher boy, a Venus 
coming out of the bath, the Cupid of Praxiteles, the 
vestal Tutia, who disproved the slanders against her by 
carrying water in a sieve from the Tiber to the Temple 
of Vesta, and the recumbent Hercules found at Hadrian's 
Villa, are some of the more remarkable objects in this 
part of the Gallery. 

The interest and impressiveness of all these objects 
are exceedingly enhanced by the recollections and as- 
sociations with which the imagination invests them. A 
poet, of a highly refined classical taste,* has very hap- 
ily alluded to these attributes ; saying, in behalf of these 
degraded antiquities, — 

" What we, and where we have been, oh ! remember, and give 

us your pity. 
Once this rare old Vase was the pride of the gardens of Egypt, 
And Cleopatra herself bade her courtiers fill it with myrtle : — 

* R. M. Milnes — " Memorials of Many Scenes." 



THE VATICAN. 73 

This so daintily carved — this duplicate layer of Onyx — 

On thy finger, Antinous, rested, a jewel unvalued — 

I, God Hermes, stood in the hall of Caesar Augustus — &c." 

A door on the left, near the middle of the quarter of a 
mile, leads into a noble hall (Nuovo Braccio), supported 
by twelve Corinthian columns (two of them taken from 
the tomb of Cecilia Metella), and paved with rich 
marble and ancient mosaics. Among the statuary with 
which it also is filled, one of the most curious is a colos- 
sal group of the Nile, displaying its river-god reclining 
at full length, accompanied by the ibis, the hippopota- 
mus, and the alligator, and surrounded by sixteen children 
playing about him, in allegorical allusion to the sixteen 
cubits which the river must rise to fertilize the land of 
Egypt. You are strongly reminded of Gulliver bound 
down and scrambled over by the Lilliputians, as recorded 
in his veracious narrative. 

The Vatican Library is entered by an adjoining door. 
Its treasures of learning are famous the world over, but 
you may walk through it without seeing a single book. 
They are all preserved in closets about eight feet high, 
built against the walls of the room, with Etruscan vases 
standing on them, and the walls above decorated with 
fresco paintings of scenes in the lives of the Popes, 
views of their palaces, and similar subjects. Among 
them are Michael Angelo's original design for Saint 
Peter's, so much more effective than the one now exe- 
cuted ; and a view of Fontana's great exploit of raising 
7* 



74 ROME. 

the obelisk in front of the church. In some side rooms 
are the fresco painting of the Nozze Aldobrandini (one 
of the finest things in Rome, for conception, feeling, 
expression and execution), and a museum of Christian 
antiquities, and other curiosities, from which the attend- 
ant, when he found that I was an American, eagerly- 
selected for my especial attention some idols from my 
own country, and seemed to wonder that I did not fall 
down and worship them. The printed books of the col- 
lection are valuable less from their number than their 
rarity, many being the only copies in existence. Among 
the manuscripts are the Greek Bible of the sixth century; 
the Acts of the Apostles, written in gold and presented 
to a Pope by the Queen of Cyprus ; a richly illuminated 
Hebrew Bible for which the Jews of Venice offered its 
weight in gold ; the celebrated palimpsest of Cicero de 
Republicd, discovered by Cadinal Mai, written over St. 
Augustine's commentary on the Psalms ; Tasso's auto- 
graph of his " Jerusalem ;" seventeen letters of Henry 
VIII. to Anne Boleyn, (fee. (fee. The principal portion 
of the library is contained in the great gallery, five hun- 
dred paces in length, divided into eighteen rooms, the 
long perspective of which you view through the door 
openings, as they recede and diminish behind one 
another. 

Returning to the Museo Chiaramonti, at its extremity 
you ascend to a square vestibule, in whose centre is the 
Torso Belvedere ; a mere trunk of a body, supposed to 



THE VATICAN. 75 

have been Hercules reposing, and now without head, 
arms, or legs, but with all its muscles and contours so 
perfectly developed and proportioned, that Michael An- 
gelo declared that he was indebted to it for all his power 
in representing the human form. Beside it stands the 
Sarcophagus of Scipio, the simple beauty of which has 
caused it to be copied in most of the cemeteries of the 
world, including Mount Auburn, where it covers the 
remains of Spurzheim. From this vestibule runs off to 
the left the " Egyptian Gallery," contained in a suite of 
rooms with architecture and ornaments very appropriately 
in the Egyptian style, and embracing a very extensive 
collection of mummies, idols, domestic utensils, and other 
reliques from the land of the Nile, among which the most 
remarkable are ten sitting statues in black basalt, of Isis, 
large as life. But these things seem out of place among 
the tokens of a purer taste in beauty, and you soon 
return to the vestibule of the Torso. 

Through two other well-filled chambers, you pass to 
the Cor tile del Belvedere, or octagonal court-yard, with a 
fountain in the centre, and surrounded by porticoes and 
pavilions which enshrine some of the master-pieces of 
ancient art. In one cabinet is the Laocoon ; the father 
with his two sons enveloped in the crushing folds of the 
serpents — " A father's love and mortal's agony, with an 
immortal's patience blending," unaltered since Pliny de- 
scribed it two thousand years ago.* In a neighboring 

* It is curious that a second head of Laocoon, believed by many 



76 ROME. 

pavilion is the Antinous ; and in an opposite one the 
Apollo, " the lord of the unerring bow," of whom it would 
be absurd profanation to say a word to any one who can 
read its poetical copy by " Childe Harold," which fully 
equals, if it does not surpass the original. A fourth 
cabinet contains Canova's " Boxers," and the porticoes 
connecting the pavilions are filled with other statues, 
busts, and sarcophagi, which elsewhere would singly be 
the pride of museums, but are scarcely noticed here in 
this profusion of art. 

The adjoining Hall of Animals would be, perhaps, the 
most interesting of all to a person of unidealized taste, for 
the most uncultivated eye can appreciate the perfect 
nature and exquisite beauty of this wonderful marble 
menagerie. Every animal is here perfectly copied in its 
most characteristic attitude. A lion is tearing a horse; 
a most graceful greyhound is playfully biting the ear of 
its fellow ; a fox, caught by its tail in a bush, is trying to 
raise its head to gnaw itself loose ; two bulls are fighting 
with locked horns ; a crab, of black porphyry, lies on a 
cushion of white marble ; a monkey holds up a cocoa-nut ; 
and alligators, lizards, peacocks, pelicans, lambs, stags, 

to be the original one, is now preserved in the land of the Goths, 
in the palace of the Due (TAreniberg, at Brussels. The story runs 
that an ancestor of the present Duke set out for Italy to pass 
several years, but returned in one month, having spent all his 
money, but bringing back with him this head, the cost of which 
he would never disclose. 



THE VATICAN. 77 

and the whole animated world, are here seen faithfully 
copied by the artists of ancient Greece. 

At the head of the next gallery is the sleeping Ariadne, 
with her limbs composed in the most profound repose, 
and sheltered by drapery falling in marble folds, which 
seem to have arranged themselves ; though colossal, the 
statue is light and airy, and its entire disposition is the 
very perfection of grace ; she is a true sleeping beauty. 
A bracelet formed like a serpent (in the antique and 
lately revived fashion), and therefore imagined to be an 
asp, gave to the statue, at its first discovery, the name of 
Cleopatra. The " Genius of the Vatican" is in the same 
gallery, and the three chambers of the next hall are filled 
with busts of gods and Emperors. In the adjoining 
" Cabinet of the Masks" is the " Crouching Venus"' (La 
Venere accovacciatd) just from the bath, and shrinking 
from sight like the chaste Susannah. The surface of the 
marble is weather-worn and honeycombed by time, till it 
is rough as sandstone ; but its exquisite beauty, in despite 
of this, gives a good lesson to those amateurs of sculpture 
who think the merit of a statue at all dependent on its 
smooth finish and high polish. 

You next enter " The Hall of the Muses," supported 
by sixteen Corinthian columns of Carrara marble, from 
the ruins of Hadrian's villa at Tivoli, paved with brilliant 
ancient mosaic, and painted with classic divinities. On 
the floor stand Apollo and the Muses, the seven wise 
men of Greece, and her most celebrated sages, orators, 



78 



and poets, among whom Aspasia is worthily placed by 
the side of Pericles. Adjoining this is the " Round 
Saloon," in the centre of which, beneath its dome, 
stands the grand porphyry vase, forty -two feet in circum- 
ference, found in the baths of Titus, where its original 
place is still shown surrounded by a circular flower-bed. 
In the succeeding " Hall of the Greek Cross" are two 
magnificent sarcophagi, of gigantic size, and each formed 
of a single block of porphyry. One contained the body 
of Constantia, the daughter of the Emperor Con stan tine, 
and the other that of the Empress Helena. Now they 
are degraded into curiosities for travellers ! They are 
covered with sculptures, wrought with great delicacy and 
finish in this most untractable material. On the former, 
little Cupids are busy in the vintage, gathering and press- 
ing the grapes, which, with the tendrils of the vine, are 
festooned along its sides ; on the other is represented a 
battle, and on its cover figures of Victory. 

You now ascend a marble staircase with bronze balus- 
trades to the " Hall of the Biga," named from its chief 
ornament, an antique white marble chariot of two wheels 
with two horses yoked before it. All travellers admire 
it greatly, and one American visitor to Rome confessed 
to me that he passed in this single room nearly all the 
time which he spent in the Vatican ; but they are not 
generally aware that the greater part of its beauty is due 
to modern restorations, though made in the spirit of the 
original, as the seat of the car, and the body of one of the 



THE VATICAN. 79 

horses, are the only ancient parts. The unpractised eye 
is often thus deceived, and you sometimes find yourself 
admiring most that part of a statue which is an addition 
of its modern repairer. 

The Etruscan, or Gregorian Museum, fills a suite of 
rooms to the left, over the Egyptian gallery. The present 
Pope has there collected, at his own expense, a host of 
interesting memorials of the Etruscans, that wonderful 
people, who conquered nearly all Italy ; who excelled in 
the arts, while the Greeks were yet barbarians, and before 
Rome was founded ; whose massive structures have 
withstood the ages which have destroyed their builders ; 
and whose origin is lost in antiquity, so that we can only 
guess that they may have been aborigines, or Pelasgi, or 
Phenicians, or Philistines from the land of Canaan. 
One of the rooms of this Museum is fitted up as an exact 
copy of an Etruscan tomb. You enter by a door widen- 
ing at the bottom in the Egyptian style, and find the 
walls hung with vases and cups of various forms, which 
are also strewn over the earth which covers a skeleton 
enclosed in a sarcophagus at the end of the tomb. On the 
walls are paintings of some scenes in the life of the 
deceased, and on the roof is a board chequered with blue, 
red and yellow squares. In tombs like this, most of the 
Etruscan antiquities have been found. Among them are 
many statues of baked clay ; sarcophagi with recumbent 
figures ; bronze statues, covered with the rich blue rust, so 
dear to antiquaries ; stamped pieces of clay, supposed to 



80 ROME. 

have been Etruscan money ; ornaments of gold, neckla- 
ces, bracelets, rings and brooches, of the most beautiful 
patterns, and most delicate workmanship, and a war- 
chariot of bronze and leather. The vases are very 
numerous, of every variety of size and shape, and all 
covered with painted groups in illustration of the legends 
of mythology, or of passages in the poets, or events of 
actual life. The colors are generally only black and red, 
and in most of them the vases seem to have been origin- 
ally red, then covered with black varnish, and this finally 
scraped away in parts so as to leave in red the figures 
desired. On a vase called " Sicilian," one of the war- 
riors bears on his shield three human legs, spreading 
from a common centre, precisely as on the coins of the 
Isle of Man, where it is accompanied by the motto, 
" Quocunque jeceris, stabit." The coincidence, if it be no 
more, is very remarkable, and merits investigation. 

The Etruscan Museum, unlike the other galleries, 
cannot be seen without a special permit, and you are not 
allowed to take any notes while in it, not even to write 
the names of the remarkable objects. In the other galle- 
ries you may write, but not sketch and the guard 
requested me to desist from even making a rough plan of the 
way in which the saloons in this labyrinth branched out 
from each other. 

Returning from the Etruscan Museum, you pass 
through the " Gallery of the Candelabra," which is over 
the Vatican Library, and is of equal length. Some mag- 



THE VATICAN. 81 

nificent antique Candelabra give name to this hall, and 
among them are interspersed in six divisions other ancient 
sculptures, such as the mysterious Diana of Ephesus ; a 
satyr, with Pan extracting a thorn from his foot ; and the 
graceful boy struggling with a goose. Next comes the 
" Gallery of Maps," painted in 1581, by the Archbishop 
of Alatri, half in plan, half in perspective, and very curious, 
as showing the geographical knowledge, or rather igno- 
rance, of that period. To them succeed the " Tapestries 
of Raphael," worked at Arras in Flanders, from his 
cartoons, seven of which are now preserved in Hampton 
Court. They depict scenes in the life of Christ, and in 
the History of St. Peter and Paul, with all the richness 
of painting, in spite of the injuries which they have sus- 
tained from time, and from their ignorant possessors, one 
of whom burnt one piece for the sake of the gold and 
silver threads interwoven with it ! But much as they 
merit long study, you hasten on to the neighboring 
" Gallery of paintings." 

Though it contains less than forty pictures, one of 
them is Raphael's Transfiguration, called by common 
consent the first in the world. In the glory which fills 
the upper part of the picture floats the figure of Christ, 
attended by Moses and Elijah. On the mountain beneath 
them are prostrated the three Apostles, shielding their 
eyes from the dazzling light of divinity. At the foot of 
the mountain the sufferings of humanity are emblemed 
by the boy writhing in demoniac convulsions, and brought 

8 



82 



by his mother to the remaining nine Apostles, who point 
up to the only power by which he can be cured. When 
Raphael died at the untimely age of thirty-seven, this 
master-piece, yet unfinished, was suspended over his 
corpse ; as if the public grief needed any such excite- 
ment ! Opposite to it now hangs his " Madonna di 
Foligno" in which the face of the Virgin is of the most 
exquisite beauty conceivable ; and near it are two repre- 
sentations of her " Coronation." In the same room is 
Domenichino's " Communion of St. Jerome," generally 
considered as second only to the " Transfiguration." It 
represents the dying St. Jerome receiving the sacrament, 
and is a most natural and intensely life-like painting of 
such a circumstance ; but though it equals reality, it 
there stops short, and does not rise to the regions of 
imagination. The other pictures are all admirable, but 
have too formidable neighbors to be very impressive. 

In America we have many very good paintings, but 
no great ones. We know nothing of what the brush can 
effect. We do not dream of the new sense which is 
developed by the sight of a masterpiece. It is as if we 
had always lived in a world where our eyes, though 
open, saw but a blank, and were then brought into another, 
where they were saluted by all objects and sights of 
grace and beauty. Such a new universe is revealed to 
us by our first visit to a great gallery of paintings. We 
learn that the art, which we had perhaps liked and ad- 
mired, as presenting the likeness of a friend or of a 



THE VATICAN. 83 

favorite landscape, or as supplying pleasant ornaments to 
our rooms, is to be reverenced as the most perfect organ 
for the expression of the highest thoughts of the soul, 
and the most potent instrument for exciting the inmost 
depths of our sympathies. But most famous pictures 
will disappoint the visitor who expects that the beauties 
of a great painting will strike him vividly and suddenly, 
like a flash of lightning. The only pictures which at 
all approach to this effect are Rubens' Crucifixion at 
Antwerp, Correggio's Saint Jerome at Parma, and Titian's 
Magdalen at Venice. All the rest require frequent and 
de ep study before a tithe of their excellences appear. 
We need a special education to be enabled to appreciate 
or even to understand their merits ; and this becomes 
self-evident when we call to mind that Painting is only 
a peculiar mode of expressing certain ideas, and is there- 
fore a veritable language, which we must learn letter by 
letter, before we can attain a comprehension of its whole 
import. As well might we expect that a foreigner, who 
had learnt just enough English to order his dinner, should 
be able to comprehend the delicate shades of beauty in 
Paradise Lost, as hope, that when we have made some 
such progress in the alphabet of the Fine Arts, we shall 
find ourselves capable of appreciating their masterpieces. 
The "Stanze (or Chambers) of Raphael" come next to 
the Picture Gallery. They are four rooms, the walls of 
which were painted in fresco by Raphael during the last 
two years of his life. I may here confess that, until I 



84 ROME. 

saw them, I did not fully realize the title of Raphael to 
be the " Prince of Painters," even after having seen his 
" Transfiguration ;" but these stanze first made me appre- 
ciate the unequalled fertility, power, feeling, and inven- 
tion of his genius. In the first is the " Incendio del 
Borgo," or the great fire which consumed the suburb of 
St. Peter's. All is in excited action ; one group of men 
are striving to extinguish the flames ; others are saving 
the women and children over the walls ; one young man, 
.(Eneas-like, is carrying off his old father on his shoulders ; 
and a group of distracted women kneeling before the 
church, on the balcony of which stands the Pope, are 
eagerly stretching out their arms to him, and imploring 
his succor. The legend states that the fire was finally 
arrested as it approached the Vatican, by the Pope's 
making the sign of the cross. On the three other walls 
are depicted the " Justification of Leo III.," " The Coro- 
nation of Charlemagne," and " The Victory of Leo IV. 
over the Saracens at Ostia." In the second stanza are 
allegorically represented- Theology, Poetry, Jurispru- 
dence, and Philosophy. The last is famous as " The 
School of Athens." Upon the steps of an imposing Gre- 
cian temple stand the greatest philosophers of antiquity. 
In the middle Plato and Aristotle dispute on philosophy, 
the former pointing towards heaven, and the latter towards 
earth. On the left Socrates is instructing Alcibiades and 
other disciples. Archimedes traces a geometrical dia- 
gram on the ground ; Pythagoras writes on his knees, 



THE VATICAN. 85 

and between them is Diogenes with his tub. This pic- 
ture is perhaps the most perfect of Raphael's conceptions, 
and its fifty-two figures are only so many variations of 
dignity and grace. In the third Stanza is the " Expul- 
sion of Heliodorus from the Temple," the most spirited 
and animated of the whole series. Heliodorus is impi- 
ously bearing off the treasures of the temple, but has 
fallen before the horse of the avenging angel, which 
rears to crush him, with a human expression of fierce 
eagerness in its attitude, and behind it two angels with 
scourges in their hands seem to glide over the pavement. 
Opposite to this painting is " Attila," with his Goths, de- 
terred from entering Rome by the apparition in the 
Heavens of St. Peter and St. Paul, with drawn swords. 
On a third wall is " The Miracle of Bolsena," and on a 
fourth " The Deliverance of St. Peter from Prison," in 
three divisions. In the centre one the angel is awakening 
St. Peter, while the prison is illumined by the rays 
from his body. On the right they are hastening away, 
while the guards sleep on the steps ; and on the left the 
aroused soldiers are rushing out in pursuit by the light 
of a torch and of the moon. The most wonderful effects 
of light and shade are here displayed, and must convince 
the greatest unbeliever in the genius of Raphael, that 
the simple and chaste style in which he especially de- 
lighted was adapted not from weakness but from choice. 
The fourth and last stanza commemorates the life of 
" Constantine," the first Christian Emperor, in four 
8* 



86 ROME. 

paintings, the most striking of which is his " Battle at 
the Ponte Molle," which we crossed just before entering 
Rome. Constantine on his white horse, has just driven 
Maxentius into the Tiber ; the two armies are fighting 
singly, hand to hand ; one man falls from his rearing 
horse, but holds to its mane, and makes ineffectual 
thrusts at his adversary, not seeing that another is about 
to stab him from behind ; others are fighting under the 
very hoofs of a horse which is about to trample them 
under foot ; others again are in a sinking boat, but fight 
on ; all are imbued with the intensest spirit of war, but 
in their midst is the touching episode, so characteristic 
of the gentle feeling of the artist, of an old soldier 
raising the dead body of a youthful standard-bearer. 

From the Stanze, you emerge into the Loggie of Ra- 
phael, an arcade or colonnade, by the side of a courtyard, 
which has its roof and wall painted by the same wonder- 
ful being. In the groinings of the coved roof are a 
series of paintings representing scenes from the Old 
Testament, beginning with the creation of the world, 
and ending with the building of the Temple of Solomon. 
The walls and pilasters are also covered with arabesque 
paintings of unapproachable grace, delicacy, and variety. 
Figures, flowers, animals, landscapes, temples, masks, 
trophies, and every conceivable freak of the imagination, 
are connected by wreaths, festoons, scrolls, &c, into a 
perfect dream of fairy land, and while revelling in the 
beauty of each, you wonder most at the inexhaustible 



THE VATICAN. 87 

invention which could alone have created them. They 
are now much faded from exposure to the weather, but 
you can readily believe that " they who saw the Loggie, 
after they were finished, when the lustre of the gilding, 
the snowy whiteness of the stuccoes, the brilliancy of 
the colors, and the freshness of the marble, made them 
resplendent with beauty on every side, must have been 
struck with amazement as at a vision of Paradise." 

Your pleasant task is now over ; you have gone 
through all the galleries of the Vatican, and, after de- 
scending two flights of stairs, and crossing a court, you 
will find yourself again at the end of the grand colonnade. 
If you have attempted even to glance at everything in 
one visit, you will feel perfectly stupified and bewildered, 
such is the immensity of things to be admired, and you 
will find that all the statues, pictures, and antiquities 
which I have mentioned in this long letter, are only a 
few stars amid the countless firmament of the Vatican. 



88 



VII. 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 



In every country of Christendom, and by every sect, 
the festival of Christmas is commemorated with more or 
less pomp and ceremony, but the Romans above all 
others make its observance their especial pride and 
pleasure, and they celebrate it in their churches with 
all the majestic processions, rich vestments, and stately 
ceremonies, which they have inherited from the ancient 
Romans, through the medium of the early Christian 
church, and which are so well adapted to impress the 
multitude with veneration for the holy mysteries which 
they are intended to emblem. 

For a month before Christmas the theatres are rigidly 
closed, and the streets are promenaded by wandering 
pipers, or Pifferarii, who come from the mountains of 
Calabria, and represent the shepherds " who watched 
their flocks by night," before the birth of Christ. They 
are very picturesque, bandit-looking characters, with their 
high, sugar-loaf hats decorated with feathers and flutter- 
ing ribbons, their shaggy sheepskin coats, their legs wound 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 89 

around with strips of gay-colored cloth, their long hair, 
and their tremendous beards. They would create a 
great sensation in Broadway, particularly with their bag- 
pipes, which are made of the entire skin of a goat, with 
the legs tied up, and which they press under their arms to 
produce their excruciating music. Two or three boys, 
in the same dress, accompany the bagpiper on shrill fifes, 
and play a lively tune, which is always the same, before 
the images of the Madonna hung up on the corners of 
many streets. One of them being just opposite to my 
window, my ears were tortured by a nearly constant 
succession of the Pifferarii piping before it, for which 
every good Christian who passed, gave them a trifle. At 
noon they take their nap on the platforms of the steps 
above the Piazza d'Espagna, and amuse their leisure 
with catching and killing the active little population of 
their persons. 

On Christmas Eve, the Cafes were rigidly shut at 
"Three hours of the night" (or eight o'clock" French" 
as our way of counting is termed), and the strangers, 
who usually passed their evenings there, were driven to 
devotion to escape ennui. The ceremonies were to begin 
at ten, P. M., with high Mass before the Pope, in the 
Sistine Chapel, in the Vatican palace, and I accordingly 
proceeded thither with some English friends. We 
ascended the great staircase already described, and found 
it brilliantly illuminated, and the doors of the chapel 
guarded by the Swiss soldiers of the Pope, in their striking 



90 



costume, designed by Michael Angelo, and composed of 
red, yellow, and black stripes, with a broad plaited ruff 
about the neck, and a drooping red feather in the side of 
the hat. To enter the chapel, or any place where the 
Pope is present, you must be in full dress, as before a 
temporal prince, and the ladies must wear, instead of 
hats, black veils on their heads. Several gentlemen 
were turned back in consequence of wearing frock-coats. 
Having entered without difficulty, we found the Sistine 
Chapel a lofty oblong apartment, divided by a grating, 
behind which the ladies were kept, and allowed to see 
the Pope only through the lattice-work. Beyond the 
grating were seats for strangers ; at the farther end were 
the high altar and throne of the Pope, and between them 
the places of the cardinals. The wall behind the altar is 
covered by the great fresco of " The last judgment," by 
Michael Angelo, who also painted the roof of the chapel. 
It is seen only dimly, and is injured by the damps, smoke 
and incense of two and a half centuries, but it still im- 
presses the spectator with the wonderful power of the 
genius of its painter. In the upper part of the picture, 
Christ sits as the stern Judge of the world, with the Vir- 
gin Mary on his right hand, the saints and patriarchs on 
one side, and the host of martyrs on the other. Below 
him, on the left, the Damned are falling headlong into the 
clutches of the demons, and on the right, the Blessed, 
assisted by angels, are rising to heaven. The picture 
displays, in the highest degree, the extraordinary skill 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 91 

and strength of the painter, but, at the same time, his 
exaggeration and extravagance, so that every one admires 
it, but none likes it. 

We could study its details at our leisure while the 
Cardinals entered at intervals. Each was preceded by 
a gentleman usher, who was accoutred in small clothes, 
with a glittering, steel-hilted sword by his side, and a 
black silk cloak thrown over his back. The Cardinals 
wore a scarlet silk robe, with a hood lined with white 
ermine, and a very long train, which was carried by a 
valet dressed in a violet-colored gown. One after 
another entered, and bowed to those already assembled, 
who rose from their embroidered cushions, and gravely 
greeted the new comers. The valets then twisted up 
their trains and sat down at their feet, holding their 
square hats, while the Cardinals retained a small red scull- 
cap on their heads to cover the tonsure. Two only 
were not in scarlet ; one wearing white, and the other 
ash color, in token of their being at the head of some reli- 
gious brotherhood. There are seventy cardinals, most 
of whom were present, and displayed a venerable array 
of grave, intellectual heads, framed, as it were, in their 
gorgeous vestments. One among them, however, looked 
to be not more than thirty years old, and joined in the 
ceremonies with a sort of contemptuous indifference, 
which seemed to presage, that some reforms might be 
expected if he ever attained the Pontifical chair. When 
the cardinals had all assembled, the " Offices" were read 



92 ROME. 

in sonorous voices by relays of priests, and at the farther 
end of the chapel appeared finally the Pope himself. 

His Holiness, Gregory XVI., is an old man of seventy- 
eight, with very white hair, and a rubicund face, from 
which projects a long and red truly Roman nose. His 
benevolence, learning, and honesty of purpose have 
secured to him the love and respect of the people in an 
unusual degree, but he is too feeble and infirm to hope to 
enjoy it much longer. As he entered he blessed us all, 
making the sign of the cross in the air with his finger, 
kneeled a moment before the altar, and was then 
assisted to mount his Episcopal throne. His robe was of 
silver cloth, and on his head he wore a cloven yellow 
mitre. Each of the cardinals in turn, with their trains 
unfolded by their valets, slowly walked up to the Pope, 
kissed his hand (not his toe), and returned to their seats. 
Then followed the music of the famous Sistine choir, 
unparalleled in any other part of the world. The chants 
are the same Phrygian and Lydian tunes by which St. 
Augustine represents himself as being melted into tears, 
and are to this day strangely powerful with their peculiar 
inflections and wailing modulations, executed in all the 
parts of the harmony by this unique choir, without instru- 
ments, and without female voices. High mass was then 
performed by the archbishop. At certain points the car- 
dinals all came forward and knelt in a circle, and their 
valets spread out their trains, like so many scarlet pea- 
cocks' tails. When they sat down, the valets twisted up 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 93 

the trains, as if they were going to wring them out, and this 
ceremony was repeated every few minutes, with a great 
deal of unnecessary trouble. The Pope was several 
times assisted to descend his throne and kneel before the 
altar ; he was perfumed with swinging censers, till the 
smoke of the incense almost hid him from sight ; and 
when he had occasion for a handkerchief, a scarlet one 
was held up to his nose by his Holiness's handkerchief- 
holder. At length mass ended, and he pronounced the 
benediction in a surprisingly clear and strong voice. By 
the side of the altar stood the hat and sword which he 
blesses on this occasion, and afterwards sends to some 
Catholic Prince, as a most valuable and honorable present. 
The cardinals now put on a third sort of hat ; broad- 
brimmed, like that of the priests, but scarlet instead of 
black, with a rich golden tassel, and drove off in their 
gorgeous carriages, all scarlet and gold, with the coach- 
men and footmen in richly embroidered liveries. The 
soldiers at every station presented arms as the carriages 
passed, as in other countries they do to princes alone. 
The fishermen of Galilee would stare to see their suc- 
cessors of Rome. 

It was now midnight, and we next hurried to the 
church of San Luigi de? Francesi, to hear its fine music. 
It was brilliantly illuminated, and before the altar the flames 
of candles of different lengths composed various figures. 
The music was very spirited, and some might have called 
it even too operatic. It was executed with the most 



94 ROME. 

finished skill, and had attracted a great crowd, whom a 
company of soldiers kept in their places. It seemed to 
be a regular saturnalia for lovemaking, and I found one 
beautiful girl (whom the crowd had parted from her 
parents, and who bore the sweet name of Felicetta, 
which may be Englished into " Pretty little happy crea- 
ture"), disposed to be very talkative and friendly. She 
flattered my progress in Italian by guessing me to be a Flo- 
rentine, but expanded her immense black eyes to an incon- 
ceivable size, when she heard that I was from America, 
and exclaimed, " Holy Virgin ! you arc as white as I am .'" 
In truth, I was rather whiter ; but we are here generally 
supposed to be negroes ; and the " Cafe Americano" in the 
Piazza oVEspagna, has an emblem of our country painted 
on its sign, in the head of a blackamoor, with woolly hair, 
flat nose, and Ethiopian lips. 

We left the church at one in the morning of Christ- 
mas day, cold and hungry. A fire of reeds was soon 
kindled at the hotel of one of the party, and we made 
ourselves comfortable for an hour by the side of the 
Pantheon. Thence we crossed the city over the Quiri- 
nal, Viminal and Esquiline hills, to the Basilican church 
of Santa Maria Maggiore, which we found crowded with 
people, and brilliantly illuminated to its very top. A 
Yankee would feel inclined to calculate how much 
money they burn up every year at Rome in church 
candles. The interior of the Basilica consists of an 
immense nave, divided from the aisles by seventy Ionic 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 



95 



columns of white marble. Above the entablature are 
rows of old mosaics, and above them again are alter- 
nating windows and paintings. The flat roof is carved 
into five rows of pannels, and gilded with gold, which 
was the first ever brought from Peru, and was presented 
by Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. Presently a troop 
of a hundred soldiers entered the church, marched down 
to the farther end, and then returned up the nave in two 
parallel files, driving the people to the sides, and making 
a clear space, from the High Altar to the front of the 
church, on each side of which they kept guard. The 
choir then commenced singing, and continued their 
chants for two hours, while we wearily stood, awaiting 
the procession, which was to have taken place at 3 A. M., 
at which time we liad reached the church. At last, 
about 5 A. M., the whole body of priests, who had 
clustered around the altar, marched down through the 
open space to the sacristy at the farther end, to get their 
sacred relic, the cradle of Christ. Presently they reap- 
peared, and returned to the high altar, with banners 
flying, music sounding, and candles burning, in a grand 
procession, at the end of which, under a canopy with 
floating streamers of gold cloth, was carried a silver 
vase, containing the holy cradle. As it passed, every 
one dropped on their knees, and the soldiers and the 
priests, the two great nuisances of Rome, were strangely 
intermixed in picturesque confusion. Mass now began, 
and we came away, having already heard it twice. 



9t3 ROME. 

From Santa Maria Maggiore, we descended to the 
foot of the Capitoline hill, and mounted the one hundred 
and twenty-four marble steps to the church of Ara Cwli, to 
pay a visit to " II santissimo Bambino" — " The most holy 
child" — whom I have already described. On entering 
the church, we saw a rocky cavern, pierced in its sides, 
and running far back into the adjoining convent. It 
was moreover painted in such skilful perspective, as to 
appear to end in the open country at some miles dis- 
tance. Along its sides were placed figures of shepherds 
and peasants, all turned adoringly to the middle of the 
grotto, where lay the miraculous image of " the most 
holy child," blazing with precious stones, while Joseph and 
Mary were fondly bowing over it. A hidden light stream- 
ed down upon it from a transparency above, on which 
were depicted hosts of angels, while the other parts of 
the scene were only dimly illuminated. The effect was 
very striking ; Correggio might have borrowed the idea of 
his '' Notte" from some such a show, and I saw a young 
French painter making a sly sketch of it in his hat. 
To complete the theatrical aspect of the scene, two little 
girls, of five or six years, stood on a table beside the 
holy-water font, and recited a poetical dialogue between 
the Madonna and a gipsy, who met her in the Flight to 
Egypt, and told her fortune. The little creatures were 
not at all embarrassed by the crowd around them, but 
spoke their parts with perfect fluency, correct emphasis, 
spirited gesticulation, and most vehement rolling of 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 97 



the Rs ; and when they had finished, their hearers cried 
" Bravo !" as at an opera. 

The night had now ended, and we had been standing 
the whole time, and had walked many miles, but our 
task of sight-seeing was not yet ended, and, after a cup 
of coffee, we hurried to St. Peter's, at the other end of 
the town, two miles distant. The last week had been 
employed in fitting up the building for the grand occa- 
sion. In the Tribune of the church, at its extreme end, 
behind the high altar, and under the chair of St. Peter, 
a magnificent Pontifical throne had been erected. It 
was covered with cloth of silver, embroidered with gold, 
and over it was hung a gorgeous canopy of scarlet, 
bound with golden cords. Two gilt cherubim, holding a 
mitre, seemed to be hovering immediately above the throne. 
On its right was the Episcopal Chair, and on its left 
two rows of boxes with red hangings, fitted up for dis- 
tinguished strangers. Below them, and nearer to the 
altar, was the Ambassadors' box, and beyond it was that 
of the noble Roman ladies. Behind them was the 
choir. Between the throne and the Chair was the 
station of the Cardinals, and other portions were en- 
closed for the reception of those who had tickets of 
admission. All these places were crowded with gen- 
tlemen and ladies in full dress, many foreign officers in 
their uniforms, and the diplomatic corps, covered with 
stars and ribbons of the various orders of knighthood. 

9* 



98 



Two files of soldiers extended up the centre of the vast 
building, and behind the altar were drawn up the Pope's 
" Guards of honor," who are composed entirely of Ro- 
man nobles, and who glittered in scarlet uniforms, faced 
with blue, and half covered with gold. At seventeen 
hours of the day (10 A. M.) the trumpets burst out with 
a stirring blast, and the procession entered from the 
Vatican, and advanced up the nave between the files of 
soldiers. The great Cross came first, followed by a 
hundred priests in purple and white, bearing lighted 
torches, and chaunting solemnly the " Psalm of en- 
trance." After them came some officers carrying three 
glittering mitres, and a cap of crimson velvet and ermine- 
Then followed the heads of the various branches of the 
Catholic Church, most conspicuous among whom was 
the Greek Patriarch, a tall, venerable old man, with a 
fine countenance and a flowing white beard, and wear- 
ing a crown of scarlet and gold. Other prelates of high 
rank followed in dazzling dresses of silver and golden 
tissues ; then came the Cardinals, attired as in the 
Sistine chapel, and lastly the Pope himself, sitting in a 
chair of state, borne on the shoulders of eight men, 
while others held over his head a white silken tent-like 
canopy, and two attendants beside him waved the 
flabella, or large white feather fans, every one drop- 
ping on their knees as he passed. His Holiness wore 
a robe of white silk and gold, and was crowned with a 



CHRISTMAS AT ROME. 99 

tiara glittering with precious stones. As he was borne 
up the church, he kept his eyes closed (the motion 
making him sea-sick !), but occasionally waved his hand 
to bless the people. At the foot of the altar he de- 
scended, knelt a moment in prayer, and then mounted 
the Episcopal Chair. The Cardinals then in turn 
kissed his hand, and the higher priests kissed the cross 
upon his slipper. He was next clothed in his Pontifical 
robes, ascended his throne, and read the Collect, after 
which some hallelujahs were sung by the numerous 
choir. He then mounted the steps of the High Altar, 
and proceeded to perform the office of High Mass, which 
is the consecration and administration of the Holy 
Sacrament, with all the traditional ceremonies judged by 
the Church most proper to impress the spectators with 
religious veneration. The Pontiff received and offered 
up the usual oblations, incensed the altar with the fumes 
of a golden censer, and washed his hands, in emblem of 
a purification of mind and body. He turned to the 
people and begged for their prayers, and then recited 
the beginning of the liturgy in a solemn chaunt, sup- 
posed to be derived from the declamations of ancient 
tragedy. A profound silence followed, till, at the raising 
of the host, every one fell on their knees, and the 
trumpets sounded a slow and solemn dirge, in wailing 
notes which pierced to every corner of the vast cathe- 
dral, and to the bottom of every heart. His Holiness 



100 ROME. 

then returned to his throne, and two deacons brought 
to him the consecrated wafer and wine, which he de- 
voutly received after first kneeling to them in veneration. 
A grand anthem was then sung, and the procession 
retired in the order in which it had entered. 

So passed fifteen hours of a Roman Christmas, and I 
benevolently hope that they may not be half as tiresome 
to the reader in their description, as they were to me in 
their reality. 



101 



VIII. 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 



The greatness and splendor of modern Rome are 
chiefly concentrated in her hundred palaces, the poorest of 
which display vast halls, lofty pillared saloons, decorated 
ceilings, antique statues, and master-pieces of painting. At 
least twenty of them possess sufficient interest to demand 
a visit from the traveller, but I will here notice only a 
few of the more remarkable. Most of them are built 
around a large courtyard, and their inner faces, which 
look into this space, are often surrounded with galleries 
or colonnades. The lower story is always on a level 
with the street, and its windows are therefore secured by 
iron gratings, often highly ornamented. A large arched 
gateway opens into the court, and beside it a staircase, 
usually with marble steps, and supported by columns of 
granite or porphyry, leads up to the state apartments ; the 
lower floor being used as the servants' offices. The 
palace front is decorated on the only true principle of 
architecture — that of ornamenting and making prominent 
the essential parts. The windows are, therefore, sur- 



102 ROME. 

rounded with pediments, water-tables, and columns, so 
that each of them becomes a miniature temple, most 
unlike the bare holes in our Astor house ; the floors of 
the different stories are indicated by rich bands of mar- 
ble ; the chimneys are changed from eyesores to orna- 
ments, and a massive cornice, with far projecting eaves 
sustained by carved brackets, crowns the edifice. The 
whole building, if not of stone, is coated with stucco, in 
perfect imitation of it. 

One of the most extensive and magnificent is the 
Doria Pamfili palace, which possesses three grand fronts, 
the principal of which is on the Cor so. Its picture 
gallery runs around the court, and is very copious and 
valuable. In it are some famous Claudes, Salvator 
Rosas, &c. A portrait of Bartolo, by Raphael, bears a 
striking likeness to Daniel Webster. The favorite sub- 
ject of the daughter of Herodias, with the head of John 
the Baptist, is here treated by Pordenone with more pro- 
priety of feeling than has been generally evinced by 
painters of greater note. She is receiving the head from 
the executioner, not with exultation, as commonly repre- 
sented, but with a downcast expression of troubled doubt, 
as if the impulses of compassion, natural to her sex and 
age, strove with her filial duty and reverence. The exe- 
cutioner looks reproachfully at her, as he hands her the 
prophet's head, and her servant-maid, on the other side, 
gazes inquiringly in her face. 

The Sciarra palace is also in the Corso, nearly oppo- 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 103 

site the Doria. Its pictures are few but choice. Among 
them are Raphael's " Violin Player," with a face like 
his own, full of sweetly-sad thought; Titian's "Arnica" 
whose beautiful countenance is evidently from the same 
original as his Florentine " Flora ;" Da Vinci's " Vanity 
and Modesty," with soft and warm Giorgione-like 
shadows ; and Guido's Magdalen " delle radici," all the 
sentiment of which is destroyed by two radishes, which 
lie by her side, and give title to the picture. One room 
is filled with fifty landscapes, by various masters. 
Breughel has made the " Forge of Vulcan" the most 
poetical of blacksmiths' shops. At the end of the long 
perspective of massive arches, a huge waterwheel is 
dimly seen ; the Cyclops are at work in the dark 
recesses, lit up by their glowing forges ; on the floor are 
piled glittering suits of armor, pyramids of golden vases, 
and the like ; while in front Vulcan himself is fitting a 
helmet to Mars, while Venus coquettishly looks on. 
Near it hangs an excellent copy, by Giulio Romano, 
of Raphael's " Fornarina." While I was examining it, 

the English Earl and Countess of K came up to it, 

and began disputing very violently as to where the 
original of it was to be found. The Earl insisted that it 
was in the Doria palace, and the Countess, that it was in 
the Barberini. After a hot dispute in their native lan- 
guage, during which I continued to study the picture, the 
lady addressed me in Italian, and inquired if I knew 
where was the original " Fornarina." " In the Barberini 



104 ROME. 

palace, Signora," I replied, also in Italian. " There, 
now," exclaimed she, in English, to her husband, who 
had a very hen-pecked manner, " I told you so, but you 
are always so positive, and always in the wrong ;" and 
so she went on, for some time, abusing his stupidity, 
while I endeavored to preserve the decorous gravity 
befitting my supposed character of an Italian, who did 
not understand English. 

The original portrait of the beautiful " Fornarina," in 
the Barberini Palace, was evidently painted by Raphael, 
as a true "labor of love." Her lar^e swimming black 
eyes express capabilities of the most intense passion, 
and her lips swell with exuberance of life. The sunny 
brown glow of her cheeks is like 

" The dusky bloom upon the peach, which tells 
How rich within the soul of sweetness dwells," 

but it melts into a creamy whiteness as it descends to 
the delicate regions less exposed to the sun, and over 
which her right hand is drawing a semi-transparent dra- 
pery. Her other hand has a ring on the middle joint of 
its wedding finger, and her armlet is inscribed with the 
name of her lover and immortalizer, " Raphaelus Urbi- 

71HS." 

The vast reception saloon of this palace contains two 
lofty canopies, emblazoned with the Bees, the armorial 
bearings of the family, which are repeated all over the 
palace. One is for the Prince to administer justice 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 105 

therefrom in feudal state, and the other for the Cardinal 
Barberini. The steward sat in one corner arranging his 
papers, and on the wall hung a list of the servants on 
duty that day, with the titles of the rooms to which they 
were assigned. Everything expressed the importance 
of the family, on which an old dependent, with whom I 
talked, expatiated with eloquent pride. But their wealth 
is much reduced ; their museum, once the richest in 
Rome, is now scattered among the various collections of 
Europe, and their Gallery has lost more than half its 
pictures. But it still retains its chief treasure in Guido's 
portrait of Beatrice Cenci, taken, according to the family 
tradition, on the night before her execution. Shelley's 
tragedy has made her sad story familiar to English 
readers, and his description of this picture leaves nothing 
to be added ; though no words, nor even copies, can give 
any idea of her touching loveliness, her expression of 
patient suffering, but gentle fortitude, her quivering, half- 
parted lips, and tender hazel eyes of a beauty unattained 
on any other canvass in the world ; but her half-turned 
head, with its golden locks escaping from the folds of its 
white drapery, haunts your memory, as if you, too, like 
Guido, had caught a last glimpse of her as she mounted 
the scaffold. 

The old Cenci palace, the ancient residence of the 

family, is in the most gloomy and obscure quarter of 

Rome. Its massive and sullen architecture, and its 

neglected and deserted appearance, accord perfectly with 

10 



106 ROME. 

the tragical associations connected with it. One win- 
dow, which is fronted with an open-work balcony, may- 
have belonged to the very chamber of Beatrice, and a 
dark and lofty archway, built of immense stones, may 
have been that through which she went out to the prison 
which she left only for the scaffold. 

In the Spada palace is preserved a portrait of Beatrice 
when a child, painted by Paolo Veronese. The hair is 
drawn back a la Chinoise, and not the least resemblance 
can be traced between it and the later one of Guido. 

But the pride of the Spada palace is the statue of 
Pompey, supposed to have been the very one familiar to 
us from our school days as a witness, and almost an 
actor, in that scene when 

" In his mantle muffling up his face, 
E'en at the base of Pompey's statue, 
Which all the while ran blood, great Caesar fell." 

The colossal figure is without drapery, except a cloak 
thrown over one shoulder ; under one arm is his sword, 
and in his hand he bears a globe, in token of the extent 
which his conquests gave to the Roman Empire. Near 
the right knee is a stain, which may be the very blood 
of Caesar. The identity of the statue has been a subject 
of learned discussion, but seems pretty well established ; 
and no relique in Rome appeals more powerfully to our 
earliest and strongest associations with classic antiquity. 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 107 

The Borghese family have long been one of the noblest 
and richest among the modern Roman Princes, and their 
palace is one of the most magnificent and well arranged 
in the city. Its gallery is the richest private collection 
in Rome, and contains seven hundred paintings, many of 
them by the greatest masters. Among the most noted 
are Domenichino's " Chase of Diana," in which the god- 
dess is less beautiful than any of her nymphs ; his 
" Sybil," and that of Guido ; Raphael's " Entombment ;" 
Titian's " Sacred and Profane Love," the latter of which 
he has unintentionally made much the most attractive ; 
and Correggio's " Danae," in which Love sits by her side 
and catches the gold as it falls, while an arch little cupid 
is testing it on a touchstone, and another is sharpening 
up his arrows ; but beautiful as it is, it wants the golden 
suffusion of the same artist's " St. Jerome," at Parma. 

In the Colonna palace is the most noble hall in Rome, 
and therefore in the world. It is two hundred feet long, 
forty wide, and as many high, with a vestibule at each 
end, divided from it by columns and pilasters of yellow 
alabaster. Its walls are lined with mirrors and pictures, 
and above its rich gilt cornices rises an arched ceiling, 
painted in fresco with the battle of Lepanto, for which 
one of this noble family was decreed the honor of a 
modern triumph in the Capitol. The old custode, who 
had passed his whole life in the service of the family, 
pointed out among the pictures the portraits of many Co- 
lonna princes, painted by Vandyke, Rubens, and the 



108 



like, who were the painters of the Kings of those times 
Some had been famous for their victories, and others, like 
Vittoria Colonna, the poetess, and friend of Michael 
Angelo, for their genius ; and the custode continued the 
noble list, till at last I exclaimed, " Truly, this is a great 
family." " Ah, signore /" replied the old man, with a 
mournful shake of the head, " E stata ! It has been !" — 
precisely the same idiomatic phrase with which Virgil 
said of Troy, " Ilium fait.'''' The coincidence was very 
impressive. The same feeling, and even the same idiom, 
has here survived for two thousand years, and fallen 
greatness is lamented by a faithful old servant in our 
day, as it was by the great poet of antiquity. The 
wealth of the family has been greatly scattered of late 
years, and the present prince has married a lady of 
Naples, where he now resides, and part of the palace is 
hired out to the French Ambassador. When I after- 
wards spoke of the magnificent effect which lighting up 
the hall must produce, the custode said that it did indeed, 
but that he had not seen it so illuminated since 1817, on 
the occasion of a great festival. The next year the 
Prince died, leaving two sons, whose history he went on 
to detail. Farther divisions took place, and lately the 
last princess of this noble house, young, beautiful, and 
high-born, has been taken from a convent to be married 
to the new-made Prince T , immensely rich, in- 
deed, but old enough to be her father, and the son of a 
man who began life as a pedlar in the " Piazza Colonna !" 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 109 

Such is the levelling and democratic power of wealth 
even in Italy, where its magic can bring about such a 
match for even the descendant of that heroic Prince, of 
whom Petrarch wrote — 

" Gloriosa Colojvna, in cui s'appoggia 
Nostra speranza, e'l gran nome Latino ; 
Ch'ancor non torte dal vero camino 
L'ira di Giove per ventosa pioggia." 

The Colonna Gardens run up the slope of the Quirinal 
hill behind the palace, and are connected with it by a 
bridge thrown from its second story across the street, 
which separates them. They are laid out in the usual 
elaborate style, and a brook which tumbles down the hill 
is conducted through various cascades, steps, and richly 
decorated grottoes. A pine tree in these gardens, long 
famous for its size and grandeur, was planted there on 
the day of Rienzi's execution, five hundred years ago ; 
but after so long an existence it was blown down in 
1842, by the same tempest which destroyed Tasso's oak, 
which stood in the gardens of St. Onofrio, and was said 
to have been the poet's favorite place of study. But the 
Colonna gardens are most famous for their fragments of 
an entablature which once crowned the " Temple of the 
Sun," on the brow of the hill. One of the white marble 
fragments must weigh alone near two hundred tons ; how 
dazzling then must have been the temple of proportionate 
size, which once looked down from this commanding site !. 
10* 



110 ROME. 

Opposite the gardens is the Rospigliosi palace, whose 
treasure is the " Aurora" of Guido, painted in fresco on 
the ceiling of a Casino in its garden. Aurora is floating 
before the chariot of the sun, and scattering flowers 
under the feet of the horses, around which hover seven 
beautiful nymphs, typical of the Hours. Its brilliant 
colors and graceful composition make it the masterpiece 
of its painter ; and the whole picture is suffused with an 
appropriate sunny hue, from which peep out the lovely 
faces of the Hours. 

The rival " Aurora" of Guercino is in the Villa Ludo- 
visi. On the way thither are the gardens attached to 
the Pope's Quirinal Palace on Monte Cavallo ; so named 
because in the Piazza in front stand the colossal groups 
of Castor and Pollux, holding their horses — the reputed 
productions of Phidias and Praxiteles. The Pope usu- 
ally resides in this palace during the summer months, as 
the situation is considered to be the most healthy, and 
the most free from malaria, of any part of Rome. The 
palace contains little worth seeing, but the gardens are 
very extensive and well kept. Wishing to enter them 
one day, I knocked at the gate, which was opened by a 
most gentlemanly looking porter, in full dress, who asked 
me for my " Permit." " Permit ?" said I, surprised at 
this requisition, of the necessity of which I was not 
before aware. " Yes," said he, " permission from his 
Holiness to visit the gardens. Have you not got one ?" 
" Oh yes," said I, at last ; " Here it is ;" and I slipped 



THE PALACES OF ROME. Ill 

into his hand a morsel of silver, here called a Paul, and 
worth about a dime. " Ah, yes," said the fellow, bowing 
low ; " walk in, Signore." So easily and so cheaply 
may you bribe even the Pope's porter ! St. Paul is the 
most efficient friend of all strangers in Rome, and will 
obtain for them anything that they may desire, if they 
will only call sufficiently often upon him — or his silver 
representative. 

The gardens are a mile in circuit, and their walks are 
lined with magnificent hedges of laurel, clipped and trim- 
med into impenetrable masses, twenty feet high, and 
almost as solid as the front of a house. These living 
walls line long straight avenues, but often the opposite 
hedges meet, and create verdant arches, vaults, and 
cathedral-like aisles ; and sometimes they enclose cir- 
cular recesses left in the wildness of nature, but showing 
statues here and there, which peep through the leaves, 
like fairies, satyrs, and wood-nymphs, once more at play 
as in the olden time. Milton's 

" Retired leisure, 

Who in trim gardens takes his pleasure," 

would here be supremely happy among the formal but 
luxuriant hedges, and the embowering foliage, which 
gives a cool shade in the hottest noon. There are abun- 
dant fountains, and the water is tortured into all possible 
forms in the style of Louis XIV. It gushes out of one 
richly-ornamented niche, and makes an organ play; the 



112 ROME. 

sound seems to wake up two cherubs beside it, who 
begin to blow their trumpets ; at that signal water shoots 
up from all the urns which line the parapet ; you are then 
warned by the guide to step aside, and instantly the 
place where you had been standing is deluged by water 
spouting up from a hundred invisible holes in the pave- 
ment ; and in the next moment you are surrounded with 
a circle of jets, which enclose you within a magic round, 
like that of Der Freischutz ; and though safe within it, 
you cannot move till the Cicerone waves his wand and 
dries up the fountains. 

The Villa Ludovisi is near the Porta Pinciana, on the 
site of the former gardens of Sallust, and is bounded on 
one side by the city walls. From the great gate runs 
an avenue lined with cypresses, set close together and 
cropped into spheres, till they look in the sun-light like 
strings of gigantic green pearls. One of the casinos, to 
the right, contains a very valuable collection of ancient 
sculpture, but in the one at the end of the avenue is the 
great " Aurora" of Guercino. The ceiling is arched on 
all sides, and the deceptive painted columns on the walls 
seem to be supporting the sky. At one end lies Tithonus 
asleep ; Aurora has just left his couch in her gorgeous 
car of day, which is drawn by two horses, who seem to 
be fiercely rushing out of the ceiling, or to be already 
half in the room. She is scattering flowers over the 
world, while the beautiful Hours fly before her, and with 
their delicate hands eagerly put out the stars twinkling 



THE PALACES OF ROME. 113 

in the Night, which is fleeing from the goddess of Day, 
who is surrounded with the most glowing hues of the 
morning. 

Whether Guercino's or Guido's Aurora is to be pre- 
ferred, has been much debated, and will depend on indi- 
vidual taste. Guido's is the sweeter, and Guercino's the 
stronger ; the former has more beauty, and the latter 
more spirit. Guercino's has an adventitious charm, in 
the great difficulty with which permission to see it can 
be obtained. St. Paul is here useless ; the single ex- 
ception which proves the rule. No visitor is admitted 
without a permit, signed by the Prince of Piombino, 
who owns the villa, and who will give it very rarely, and 
then only to his Italian friends. He is said to do this in 
-revenge for the churlishness which he himself experi- 
enced on a visit to England. Many strangers pass 
a season in Rome without seeing the Villa Ludovisi, and' 
those who are more fortunate (as I happened to be, 
through the kindness of an American artist and a Roman 
nobleman), naturally extol to the utmost the beauties 
which are so generally inaccessible. A good story is 
told in illustration of the inflexibility of the rules of the 
Villa. The Pope happened to drive past it one day, and 
seeing over the gate the name " Villa Ludovisi," he 
ordered his coachman to stop. The porter appeared, 
and told him that he could not come in. " What ! Do 
you not know me ?" exclaimed the Pope in surprise. 
" Yes, your "Holiness," answered the porter ; " but if 



114 ROME. 

you were St. Peter himself, I could not let you in with- 
out an order from my master." The Pope was forced to 
drive off ungratified, and the porter ran to the Palace 
and told his master what he had done. The Prince 
praised his fidelity, and the next day sent him to the 
Pope with a golden key of the Villa, and a message to 
the effect, that though his Holiness held the keys of 
Heaven and Hell, he had never before received the key 
of the Villa Ludovisi. 



115 



IX. 



ANCIENT BATHS AND MODERN FOUNTAINS. 

The grandeur of the ancient Romans is nowhere more 
impressive than in their Baths. The name suggests to 
us moderns only a common house, divided into little 
closets, each containing a tin tub ; but the Roman Baths 
covered sometimes sixty acres of ground, with their 
marble structures. Vestibules, like great temples, led 
into halls containing cold, tepid, warm, and steam baths ; 
an immense square in the centre was arched over for 
exercise in bad weather ; in another court was a large 
swimming-basin; in the corners were libraries and 
music-saloons ; and in other halls philosophers lectured 
and poets recited. All the edifices were adorned with 
statues and paintings, for the Romans loved to unite all 
the pomp of art and the pleasures of imagination with 
the luxury of water, so particularly grateful in their 
warm climate. We may imagine what treasures of art 
they contained, from the value of those which have been 
rescued from jthe ruins. In the Baths of Caracalla 
alone were found the Farnese Hercules, the colossal 



116 ROME. 

Flora, the Toro Farnese, the Torso Belvedere, and the 
Venus Callipyge ; the Laocoon came from the Baths of 
Titus ; and the Apollo Belvedere from the Baths of Nero, 
near Ostia. 

The ruins of the Baths of Caracalla are more striking, 
from their vastness, than those of even the Coliseum. 
Their massive walls and arches seem strong enough to 
bear the pyramids, and rise like mountains of brick, upon 
which grow young forests of shrubs and flowers. Here 
was Shelley's favorite resort, and on these dizzy arches 
he composed his great " Prometheus Unbound." Where 
the vaulted roofs remain, they are covered with mosaic 
figures ; and brightly colored mosaic pavements, bent and 
contorted by the weight of the fallen fragments, are 
found wherever excavations have been made. You see 
recesses and niches for statues, conduits for the water, 
and other mementos of the former condition of things ; 
but you find the bare brick walls stripped of their facings 
of fine marbles, and in the immense chambers are no 
remains of their original sixteen hundred marble seats 
for bathers. Serpents are now the only inhabitants of the 
vast pile, except the keeper, who lives in a modernized 
corner, and who, the year before, had killed a snake six 
feet long, with a head " as large as your two fists," on 
the very top of the highest arch, a hundred feet in the 
air. Perhaps its body had been tenanted by the spirit of 
some transmigrated Roman, possibly the Emperor Cara- 
calla himself, still haunting the spot of his former enjoy- 



ANCIENT BATHS. 117 

ments, and meditating on the change, like Marius on the 
ruins of Carthage. 

The Baths of Titus are better preserved, though less 
imposing. They were built over Nero's famous " Golden 
House," which, in its turn, was raised upon the founda- 
tions of the Villa of Maecenas, and fragments of the 
mosaic pavement, on which once trod the patron of 
Horace and Virgil, still peep out from under the later 
walls. The chambers and corridors retain their an- 
cient arabesque paintings in fresco, which cover them 
with fanciful figures of women, birds, animals, flowers, 
and the like, enclosed in medallions, and connected by 
rich.borders and varied ornaments. From them Raphael 
took the idea of his famous arabesques in the Vatican. 
After being first opened in his time, they were filled up 
by the government to prevent their becoming a shelter 
for banditti, but were re-opened by the French army in 
1812, and my guide, who was present at the time, says, 
that the colors were as yivid and brilliant as if painted 
the day before. They have now greatly faded, but it is 
still highly interesting to trace out these paintings of the 
old Romans, which have never met the light of day, and 
were seen by them, as now by us, only by the light of 
torches. In one saloon is shown the place where stood 
the great porphyry vase, now in the Vatican ; a jet of 
water fell into it, and was surrounded by a wall, grooved 
to receive an encircling bed of flowers. How different 
from the down-trodden sod around our Park fountain ! 
11 



118 ROME. 

In a neighboring niche originally stood the Laocoon. 
These things which are now the objects of our highest 
wonder and admiration, were the every-day furniture of 
the ancients. Has the world really made so much pro- 
gress since then as we, in our self-love, are apt to 
assume 1 

Near these Baths is a reservoir called the Sette Sale, 
divided into parallel compartments by eight walls, each 
pierced with four arched openings so arranged that each 
is opposite to a solid wall. The object of this is stated 
by Murray, with most remarkable ignorance of the first 
principles of hydrostatics, to be " the prevention of the 
pressure of the water on the lateral walls." He does not 
often err so egregiously, and many other travellers might 
profit by a little more scientific knowledge, for I have 
had occasion to retort this same blunder of his country- 
man upon an Englishman, who was laughing at a distin- 
guished American traveller on our own continent for his 
ludicrous attempt to make Plaster of Paris by burning 
oyster-shells, in innocent ignorance that one was a sul- 
phate of lime, and the other a carbonate ! 

Leaving the Esquiline hill, we find on the Viminal the 
remains of the Baths of Diocletian. Forty thousand 
Christians were employed upon the works, according to 
the histories of the martyrs, and now, by a retribution of 
Nemesis, the great central hall of the structure has been 
converted into a Christian church, " Santa Maria degli 
Angeli." Michael Angelo altered it into the shape of a 



THE PANTHEON. 119 

Greek cross by adding a wing, retaining the original 
granite columns (forty-five feet high and sixteen in cir- 
cumference), which supported the roof of Diocletian's 
baths. The modern church is one of the most imposing 
and beautifully proportioned of all in Rome. Its altar- 
pieces were originally painted for St. Peter's, but super- 
seded there by mosaic copies, and transferred hither for 
the enrichment of its beauty. The astronomerjs interest- 
ed by a brass band which crosses the church diagonally, 
and marks the Meridian line traced by Bianchini in 
1701. The other portions of the original site of the 
baths are covered by a convent with a fine cloister, sur- 
rounding, with its hundred columns, a square, which is 
filled with orange trees. In its centre is a fountain over- 
shadowed by four immense cypresses, planted by Mi- 
chael Angelo, and in one corner a small enclosure marks 
the humble cemetery where are buried the monks who 
have passed their lives in meditations in the cloisters, 
within which it is embraced. 

We receive the highest idea of the grandeur of the 
Roman baths when we learn that the " Pantheon, pride 
of Rome," was most probably only a Caldarium, or 
" Hot water saloon," of the Baths of Agrippa ! In those 
days Utility and Beauty went hand in hand ; we mod- 
erns think the two ideas inconsistent, and timidly shrink 
from making works, which are useful, ornamental as 
well. Not so the ancient Romans. The Portico 
which fronts the Rotunda of the Pantheon (a mere hot 



120 



water saloon !) is declared by a most competent judge to 
be not merely faultless, but " positively the most sublime 
result that was ever produced by so little architecture." 
I first came upon it unwittingly, as I was passing through 
the dirty Herb-market on which it fronts ; and its perfect 
proportions, independently of any associations, at once 
caught my eye, and arrested my steps by their contrast 
with the squalid filth amid which the graceful columns 
seemed so out of place. So uninjured is it by time that 
no idea of its antiquity crossed my mind, till I read on its 
frieze the still perfect inscription, " M. Agrippa. C. F. 
Cos. tertium fecit." But, then, it must be confessed, 
its real beauty seemed of a sudden immensely enhanced 
by its classic associations. Between its sixteen granite 
columns, which are so arranged as to seem twice as 
many, you pass to the original bronze doors, twenty feet 
wide and forty high, and enter the Rotunda itself. You 
find it a circular hall of great size (one hundred and forty- 
three feet in diameter and as many in height.) and sur- 
mounted by a hemispherical dome, in the centre of which 
is an opening, through which streams down all the light 
which enters. The proportions are so perfect that you 
feel their harmony as you would that of a strain of Mo- 
zart's music. Around the circle are alternate niches 
and altars, and their columns and pilasters support a 
richly sculptured cornice, over which is an attic, from 
above which springs the dome. The building is paved 
and lined with rich marble, but the bronze lining of its 



AQUEDUCTS. 121 

roof has been stripped off by Goths and Popes ; Urban 
VIII. alone having removed 450,000 pounds, to make the 
spiral columns of the canopy over the high altar in St. 
Peter's, and to cast cannon for the castle of St. Angelo. 
But, after all these devastations, the Pantheon still 
remains, 

" Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime, 
Despoiled, yet perfect." 

In the year 608, it was consecrated as a church, and 
thus was saved from the fate of most other Pagan tem- 
ples. It is now doubly sacred as the burial-place of 
Raphael. 

A very tolerable notion of the shape of the Pantheon 
may be obtained from the rotunda of the New York 
Custom House, supposing it to be doubled in all its 
dimensions. Such is the building which Michael Angelo 
has " hung in the air" over the church of St. Peter's ! 

All these Baths, as well as the Fountains of ancient 
Rome, were supplied with water by nine Aqueducts from 
twelve to sixty-two miles in length. Their gigantic 
arches still stride across the Campagna, in desolate 
majesty, and are among the most impressive testimonials 
of ancient magnificence. Standing in the south-eastern 
outskirts of the city, beside one of their massive piers, 
you may see the arches, sometimes perfect, and some- 
times in ruins, stepping along from pier to pier, high in 
air, and seeming to diminish as they recede, till they 
11* 



122 ROME. 

fade out in the far perspective. What a deluge they 
must have poured into the city, since three of the nine 
give a most copious supply for all the wants of modern 
Rome, including her numerous and always flowing 

FOUNTAINS ! 

Every square in Rome — every public edifice — almost 
every private garden — is made cheerful and picturesque 
by the gush of water from Fountains decorated with 
sculpture and statuary. None are more graceful than 
the two in front of St. Peter's (in which the jet falls 
into a vase, from the sides of which it streams in a cir- 
cular sheet into a second vase, and from it again into a 
marble basin), but the others are so ingeniously varied 
in form and ornaments, that no two are alike, although I 
find forty-four engraved in " a selection of the principal 
fountains of the renowned city of Rome, 1 ' published 
there in 1773. In one, a broad sheet of water pours 
down from a high aperture ; in another a nymph empties 
the stream from her pitcher ; in a third, dolphins pour it 
from their mouths ; and in one of those which are 
always running from the walls for common use (the 
"free hydrants" of Rome), the water flows from the 
bunghole of a marble cask, which a marble porter is 
holding in his arms. In one Piazza the fountain is 
shaped like a boat, of which the main jet represents the 
mast ; in another, four graceful youths support the basin 
on their heads ; and in a third, a Triton sits on a shell 
supported by four dolphins, and holds over his head a 



MODERN* FOUNTAINS. 123 

conch, from which spouts up the water. The Piazza 
Navona contains three fountains, and in the principal 
one an Egyptian obelisk stands on a mass of rock, 
pierced with caverns on every side, and having chained 
to it four river gods, representing the Danube, the 
Ganges, the Nile, and the Rio de la Plata ; so that the four 
quarters of the globe are thus made tributary to the Impe- 
rial city. The Fontana Paolina rises like the front of a 
church on the Janiculum hill, overlooking all Rome, and 
three torrents rush through its central arches, and fall 
into a large basin, from which they roll down the hill, 
turning mills and supplying reservoirs. Over the Fon- 
tana delV Acqua Felice rises an Ionic arcade, in the cen- 
tral niche of which stands Moses striking the rock at his 
feet, from which the water gushes out, and Aaron and 
Gideon figure in the basso-relievos on the other side. At 
the Quattro Fontane (known to our countrymen in Rome 
as the location of the American Consulate), two broad 
streets cross each other at right angles, and when you 
stand at their intersection, your view is terminated in 
three directions by Egyptian obelisks, one on Monte 
Cavallo, a second at the Trinita cW Monti, and a third 
before Santa Maria Maggiore. At each of the four 
corners of the streets the angles of the houses are cut 
away, and fountains are there constructed, with figures 
recumbent under sculptured trees, and other emblematic 
decorations. 

But the Fountain of Trevi is the finest in all Rome, 



124 ROME. 

and therefore in all the world. In front of a palace 
adorned with Corinthian columns and pilasters, huge 
masses of rocks are piled up, so natural in shape and 
arrangement, that they seem to have been first broken by 
an earthquake, and then worn by the rush of water into 
their present forms. From every niche and crevice, to 
the right and to the left, upward and downward, gush 
out torrents of water, in the most copious variety, and, 
finally, fall into a capacious white marble basin. In the 
midst of the rocks, and under a niche in the palace, a 
colossal statue of Neptune stands on a car, to which are 
harnessed two sea-horses, held by Tritons. The god of 
the Ocean majestically extends his right arm, as if about 
to rebuke the boiling waves with his famous "Quos 
ego — ." On each side of the niche which he occupies 
are statues of Salubrity and Abundance, with appropriate 
basso-relievos. All the accessaries thus combine to 
heighten the admiration of the visitor to the Fountain of 
Trevi. 

But should we be satisfied to admire when we can 
emulate 1 The rear of our New York City Hall offers 
an excellent site for a similar work. It is now an eye- 
sore ; but we may make it an ornament to the city by 
arranging artistically before it rough masses of rock 
(pleasant reminders, in the crowded city, of rural 
scenes), and pouring over them our Croton river, which 
should gush naturally from irregular openings, as if it 
were just bursting up from its source. We may then 



MODERN FOUNTAINS. 125 

employ our American sculptors to decorate the building 
in a style worthy of our future destinies, and in a grand 
central niche erect a statue, not of the false god, 
Neptune, but of the true man, Washington ; and thus 
make this one of his long-desired Monuments. 



126 



A ROMAN DINING-HOUSE AND CAFE. 

Some travellers are most interested in Antiquities ; 
others in Painting and Statuary ; others again in Palaces 
or Churches ; but all agree in having one taste in com- 
mon, and in appreciating the importance of one matter 
which comes home every day to the bosom of all, in the 
shape of Dinner. The European mode of living is 
much more independent than our own punctual gregari- 
ousness. If you take apartments at a hotel, you are not 
expected to breakfast or dine there, unless you announce 
your intention each day in advance ; and you usually 
find it more pleasant to breakfast at a Cafe, and dine 
at a restaurant, at any hour that may best suit you, and on 
such viands as you may choose ; instead of sitting down, 
as with us, at a crowded table, at such time, and to such 
dishes as may please your landlord, not yourself. The 
Roman trattorie, or eating-houses, are inferior to those of 
most continental cities, but still the experienced traveller 
will find them quite competent to satisfy his daily needs. 
The most showy one is Bertini's, in the Corso ; the best 
national cookery is found at the Falcone, near the Pan- 



A ROMAN DINING-HOUSE. 127 

theon ; and Englishmen find the best steaks at the Gab- 
bione, a dark den, near the fountain of Trevi ; but the 
English artists dine at the Scalinata ; and the younger 
artists of all nations, English, French, German, and 
American (who of themselves can fill quite a table), may 
be found towards sunset, calling for Macaroni, Mauzo, 
and Cignale, at the Lepre, in the Via Condotti. 

The Lepre is the most extensive trattoria in Rome, 
and each of its numerous rooms is usually occupied, 
almost exclusively, by visitors of some one nation, and is 
named accordingly. The old waiter in the English 
room, Origlia byname, is somewhat of a character. He 
followed Napoleon to Moscow, where he suffered greatly, 
and even yet cannot bear to hear any jocose sounds like 
groans, as they remind him so painfully of the real ones 
which he there heard. All the rest of his life he has 
passed here, and has accumulated a little fortune out of 
the two cents, which is his regular fee from each guest. 
He is a great favorite with the young artists, to whom he 
often gives credit, on his own responsibility, for many 
weeks in succession, when, as will sometimes happen, 
their funds have temporarily run out. He hands you the 
bill of fare, on which five hundred dishes are put down, 
though but a hundred of them are prepared on any one 
day. Their names are " confusion worse confounded" 
to a foreigner, even if he knows something of the lan- 
guage ; for very many of them are not set down in any 
dictionary, and they are not classified as " fish, flesh, or 



128 



fowl," but as "boiled, roasted, fried," &c, so that a frog 
may be the next thing to a wild-boar. But on looking 
over the long catalogue, you will recognize some old 
friends somewhat disguised, in " RosbifF," " Bifstek," 
" Plom-buden," and " Patate," and, with them to fall 
back upon, you may try at a venture one unknown name 
every day, and so learn them all by degrees. There is, 
however, much uncertainty in this practical course of 
study, for in my self-instructing experiments I once 
ordered " CucuzzoU repiene" and it proved to be a stuffed 
o-ourd ! Another day I had been looking at some ancient 
columns of Cipollino marble, and afterwards finding the 
same name in the dinner list, I called for it from curiosity, 
remembering that Franklin had made saw-dust pudding, 
and thinking that the Romans might, perhaps, make 
marble-dust pie, but the Cipollino appeared in the form 
of fried onions ! It was thus that I initiated myself in 
the mysteries of the Italian kitchen, and you may now 
profit by my experience. 

But before you enter on the discussion of the solids, 
the waiter will ask you — not whether you wish Wine, 
but what wine you wish. Though the Romans have the 
most abundant supply of good water in the world (not 
excepting even the Croton), they never drink it at dinner. 
Its place is supplied by some of the numerous varieties 
of wines, as Velletri, Marino, Grotto Ferrato, Orvieto, 
&c, which figure on the list. They cost only a few 
cents the flask, which makes its appearance bound 



A ROMAN DINING-HOUSE. 129 

around with straw to protect it from fracture, and with a 
few drops of oil in its neck to preserve the contents from 
the air. This oil is extracted by cotton before the wine 
is poured out, but new comers, not aware of this iittle 
secret, unwittingly mix the two together, and then won- 
der at their oily glasses. The mild and grateful wines 
of Rome are most utterly unlike the fiery compounds of 
Madeira, Xeres, and Port, which we call wine, but which 
an Italian would call Alcohol ; they resemble rather new 
cider, with its fruity nature perfumed by the delicate 
flavor of the grape, which varies on every hill to suit 
every taste. They are very slightly fermented (not 
enough so to bear a sea-voyage), and realize most 
nearly the Biblical notion of the pure juice of the grape. 
The great cause of Temperance among us would re- 
ceive extensive and permanent benefit from the cheap 
manufacture from our native grapes of similar beverages, 
as harmless, if not beneficial, in their effects, as they are 
agreeable in their flavor. 

Your selection being made (and I recommend Grotto 
Ferrato), you will then look at the list of Soups, which 
contains fifty names, including the many varieties of 
Paste, of which only two, Macaroni and Vermicelli, are 
usually found in America, though I have counted fifteen 
species in one shop- window, all based on the original 
flour and water. Among them are, Capellini, finer than 
Vermicelli ; Semolino, looking like melon-seeds ; Capel- 
12 



130 ROME. 

letti, twisted and spiced ; Amandoletti, shaped like small 
almonds ; Agnellolti, Lasagni, and a host beside. 

Soup is followed in Florence by green figs and Bologna 
sausages ; a strange conjunction and time for these 
articles, but not more so, perhaps, than the capers and 
anchovies which precede it in Naples, or the coppery- 
oysters with which the gourmand of Paris commences 
his repast. These gastronomic peculiarities of different 
cities (which once a day force themselves on the travel- 
ler's attention) have not been adopted at random, but are 
doubtless founded on some mysterious harmonies be- 
tween the articles which are thus married to each other. 

You are now prepared to choose something substantial 
from the long and puzzling list before you. Besides the 
English names already given, you will recognize Metro- 
doihel, Matalotta, and Ammesseduen, as perversions of 
the French Maitre oV Hotel, Matelotte, and Macedoine. 
The rest will be darkness to you, for even if you under- 
stood each separate word, what would you expect from a 
" Mosaic of Mutton" or from " Gilded Brains ;" or how 
could you guess that this poetic language called Toma- 
toes " Apples of Gold" and Cream " Flower of Milk ;" 
or that " English Soup" meant a piece of sponge-cake 
swimming in wine-sauce with a cherry at its top ? You 
must, therefore, trust to chance, if you have no expe- 
rienced companions, and you will at last learn that the 
favorite Roman dishes are Cignale, or Wild Boar (the 
hunting of which is a favorite sport) ; Porcospino, or 



A ROMAN DINING-HOUSE. 131 

Hedgehog ; Lepre, or Hare ; and Testicciuola, or Lamb's 
Brain. Of Birds, you have Quails, Larks, Plovers, 
Thrush, Woodcock, and the delicate Beccafica, or Fig- 
pecker ; but of Fish, you find a scarcity, excepting Ran- 
occhie, which, being interpreted, signifies Frogs. Cardone 
in Stufa, or stewed Thistles, is a favorite dish, and you 
may safely eat it without ' ; writing yourself down an 
ass." Many articles receive names of temporary noto- 
riety ; and when the dancing of Cerito was setting the 
Romans as frantic as Ellsler's did some of our people 
(though with much more reason), the genius of some 
excited cook invented a new dish, looking like an 
ostrich's egg, with the head of a bird just emerging from 
it (in anticipation of the Eccaleobion), but proving on trial 
to be a ball of rice, surrounding the body of a thrush ; and 
he named it " Bomba alia Cerito." You will be agree- 
ably surprised not to find yourself annoyed by the oil and 
garlic, for the excess of which Italian cookery is so 
falsely abused. Lemons are used as a universal sauce 
to relieve the grossness of meat. Funghi, or mushrooms, 
are added to most dishes, in spite of their dangerous 
character, several Roman Emperors being recorded to 
have died from their effects. The warmth of the climate 
must naturally develope their poisonous qualities, as 
well as their high flavor, but they seem now to have lost 
their evil potency. A friend of Forsyth, however, on 
digging up one of enormous size, found a nest of vipers 
at its root ; a curious coincidence with Pliny's statement 



132 ROME. 

that mushrooms are poisonous, " si serpentis caverna 
juxta fuerit." 

The ordinary dessert of figs, grapes, and nuts, is 
called Giardinetto, or " Little Garden ;" a much better 
name than the corresponding " Four Beggars" of the 
French. If you order grapes separately, you must be 
careful to pronounce Uva so that it cannot be confounded 
with Uova, or, like an unlucky friend of mine, instead of 
grapes, you will be served with eggs. The grapes display 
great varieties of shape, color, and flavor ; and the fresh 
fig possesses a delicate sweetness, of which we have no 
example in our country. There are two species, green 
and purple ; the latter the more luscious, but the former 
the more delicate. At first a stranger devours them 
with avidity, but, when the novelty is over, they soon 
cloy on his appetite. When you call for your account, 
the waiter repeats everything that you have had, with 
wonderful precision and rapidity, appending to each its 
price (which is ridiculously small, usually from three to 
six cents per dish), and carrying along the sum total 
with uninterrupted fluency. He then sets before you the 
stuzzicadente, or tooth-picks, made of slender splinters of 
boxwood, whittled to a point. It is curious to see how 
etiquette varies with latitude and longitude, since here it 
is perfectly proper to end your dinner with articles 
which a little farther westward are so emphatically 
tabooed. Here they are brought in such abundance that 
there is one for every tooth in your head, and they are 



THE CAFE GRECO. 133 

often made ornamental by being stuck around a porcelain 
hedgehog pierced with holes, like a miniature of those in 
which crocuses and the like are sometimes planted. 

From the Trattoria, everybody adjourns to a Cafe ; 
and directly opposite to the Lepre is the Cafe Greco, the 
general rendezvous of the artists of all nations. It has 
existed two hundred years on the same spot and with the 
same name. When you enter, you find the smoke so 
dense that you can scarcely see across the room, but 
through it dimly appear the long beards, fierce moustaches, 
slouched hats, slashed velvet jackets, frogged coats, and 
wild, but intellectual, countenances, which characterize 
most of the young artists of Rome. All are smoking, 
or taking their after-dinner coffee, or talking in a confu- 
sion of languages, compared to which Babel was a deaf- 
and-dumb asylum. Those who wish for the waiter, call 
out " Botteca /" (meaning " Shop") or produce a sharp 
sound between a hiss and a whistle ; to which he replies, 
" Eccome /" (here I am) or " Momentino" (in a little mo- 
ment), or" Subito" (suddenly), which last practically means 
" Some time in the course of the evening." You seat 
yourself where you can find room, and may join in the 
conversation without any offence, for this is far from being 
a formal region ; but you must beware of any national 
allusions, for your neighbor who talks to you in French, 
may be a Russian or a Hottentot. As a proof of this, a 
moustached gentleman by my side accosted me one eve- 
ning in Italian ; after some indifferent; conversation, an 
12* 



134 ROME. 

interesting subject was started, and as my Italian vocabu- 
lary was not then very well stored, after floundering on 
some time with the aid of the kindred Latin and Spanish, 
I asked my new friend if he spoke French. He replied 
in that language, " I speak it very badly. Monsieur is 
French ?" " Not at all," I answered, " I am American." 
Whereupon, to my utter surprise, he exclaimed in the 
strongest brogue of the Emerald Isle, " Och, then I sup- 
pose you can spake English !" And thus we unexpect- 
edly found ourselves in possession of a common language, 
while we had been for some time struggling to make our- 
selves understood in a tongue foreign to us both. 

Though visitors of all degrees are attracted to the Cafe 
Greco by the excellence of its coffee, (which the propri- 
etor imports directly from Mocha), the majority of its 
habitual guests are artists, and in the company of some of 
them I adjourned thence one evening to a Ponte Molle, 
or Artists' Festival. One of my companions was that 
night to be initiated into the general Association of Artists 
in Rome, the majority of whom are Germans, and who 
unite for mutual assistance and social enjoyment. The 
Ponte Molle is the bridge by which Northerners enter the 
city, and its name is therefore given to the fete, which is 
the tax of the initiated. It was held in the trattoria 
Monte Citorio, behind the post-office; and about two hun- 
dred artists of all nations were there assembled in their 
most extravagantly picturesque costumes, most of them 
looking like Cavaliers of Charles I., and all busily eating, 



an artists' ponte molle. 135 

drinking, and smoking. At the farther end of the chief 
room, the President was selling at auction a collection of 
drawings, paintings, &c, contributed by the more pros- 
perous members of the society, that the proceeds of the 
sale might be applied to the relief of their poorer brethren 
in art. All currencies were named in the biddings, and 
when an Austrian offered a zwanziger, an American par- 
alleled it precisely with " A Yankee shilling." The sale 
went off gaily and successfully. Some fine glees were 
then sung, all joining in the chorus and beating time 
with clashing glasses. The initiation then took place. 
The doors of an adjoining room were thrown open, and 
displayed the tableau vivant of the candidate, wrapped in 
a scarlet mantle, standing on a table, and assuming suc- 
cessively the postures of the Apollo Belvedere, the flying 
Mercury, and the like, as proofs of his artistic taste. The 
assembly was then asked, if they thought him worthy of 
being elected " Knight of the Baiocco." The response 
was a chorus of " Yes" " Oui" " Si" " Ya" and other 
affirmations, and he was immediately invested with the 
ribbon and medal of the order, to wit, a new baiocco, or 
Roman cent ; a democratic burlesque on the orders of 
knighthood, in token that artists, should acknowledge the 
aristocracy of genius alone. The new knight then 
received a horn of terra cotta, holding about a quart, as 
his Scandinavian drinking cup. He went the rounds of 
the room, touching the glasses of every one, and a Ger- 
man ode, composed in honor of him and the society, was 



136 ROME. 

then sung. The election of officers nsxt took place, and 
finally the crowd dispersed in perfect harmony, having 
renewed and strengthened, by their friendly festivities, 
the fraternal ties which here unite into one brotherhood 
the thousands of every nation who congregate in Rome 
for the common pursuit of Art. 



137 



XL 

THE VELABRUM, THE GHETTO, AND THE TRASTEVERE. 

A remarkable number of interesting antiquities are 
contained within the narrow circuit of the Velabrum, a 
low piece of ground which lies between Mount Palatine 
and the Tiber Most conspicuous among them is the 
Temple of Vesta, an elegant little structure of Parian 
marble in the purest Greek style, circular in shape, and 
surrounded by twenty Corinthian columns. The bronze 
models of it, manufactured by the Roman tradesmen as 
classical inkstands, have scattered its graceful form over 
the world. It is now converted into a church, as is too 
the neighboring temple of Fortuna Virilis, dedicated to 
Saint Mary of Egypt, but retaining on its frieze the 
heathen ornaments of oxen's heads, little Genii, and can- 
delabra supporting festoons. Another temple is built 
into the Church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, and in its 
portico is the famous "Mouth of Truth." This is a 
round slab of marble, five feet across, in the middle of 
which is roughly sculptured out a large face with open 
mouth. The witness, instead of " kissing the book," as 
in modern times, put his hand into this mouth when he 



138 ROME. 

made his affirmation, fully believing that, if he testified 
falsely, the marble lips would shut upon his hand, and 
crush it in punishment for his perjury. The mouth still 
gapes open, as of old, but it seems now to have lost its 
miraculous powers. 

Turning your back on the river, and passing through 
the Arch of Janus (a huge square mass of masonry, 
pierced by two arches at right angles to each other, so 
as to form a shelter in stormy weather), you descend a 
road which slopes downward between two high walls, till it 
ends in front of a perpendicular pile of stone-work over- 
hung with ivy, under which passes the Cloaca Maxima. 
This was the main sewer of ancient Rome, and, undig- 
nified as it may seem, it is one of the greatest wonders 
which remain to us. It is a subterraneous arched pas- 
sage, large enough for a load of hay to pass through, 
and covered with a triple arch of immense blocks put 
together without cement, but so indestructibly, that they 
have lasted from five hundred years before Christ, down 
to the present time, and still bid fair to outlive all the 
other antiquities of the world. Beside its mouth boils up 
a remarkably bright and clear spring, to which the people 
attribute potent qualities in some diseases, and which is 
supposed to be the precise spot at which Castor and Pollux 
were once seen watering their horses. Retracing your 
steps, you come upon the house of Rienzi, " the last of 
the Roman Tribunes." Its walls display a most singular 
and incongruous collection of antique ornaments. Frag- 



THE VELABRUM. 139 

ments of columns and capitals, carved cornices, broken sta- 
tues, and the like, are built into the walls as if they were 
common stones, and are laid on their sides or their tops, just 
as the mason found most convenient. Among them are 
large patches of bare brick wall, so that the general 
effect is like that of richly carved old furniture in the 
garret of a log-cabin. A little farther is the Church of 
San Niccolo in carcere, built on the site of three temples, 
whose columns are incorporated in its walls, and one of 
which stands over the dungeon, which was the scene of 
the story of the " Roman daughter." You descend into 
a dark cell, and may then say with Childe Harold — 

" There is a dungeon in whose dim drear light 
What do I gaze on ? Nothing : look again ! 
Two forms are slowly shadowed on my sight — 
An old man and a female young and fair," &c. 

Passing by the Theatre of Marcellus (which is like a 
piece of the Coliseum), and the Portico of Octavia 
(whose tall columns supported arches to shelter the peo- 
ple from rain and sun), you enter the Ghetto, or Jews' 
quarter. Within its narrow limits all the Jews in Rome , 
are compelled to reside, and in it they are locked up 
every night by iron gates which are placed at the head 
of each of the streets leading from it. This illiberality 
seems scarcely credible to Americans, who are born and 
bred in the axiomatic belief that all men and creeds have 
equal rights, but the same restriction existed at the free 
city of Frankfort on the Maine, till a bombardment 



140 



knocked down the gates in 1796 ; and in the same city, 
until 1834, the number of marriages among the Hebrews 
was not allowed to exceed thfrteen yearly. Their con- 
dition is becoming gradually ameliorated even in Rome, 
for formerly they were obliged to race on foot in the 
Corso during the Carnival, for the amusement of the 
people, but now horses run, and the Jews only supply the 
prizes, which are usually pieces of rich velvet. An old 
Italian one day told me an anecdote, which illustrates the 
popular feeling towards them. We were walking past 
the Tor de' Conti at the foot of the Quirinal, and he said 
that this tower was formerly inhabited by a Prince who 
had an especial antipathy to the Jews, and used to 
keep a supply of big stones beside an upper window with 
which he would pelt the poor creatures as they passed 
by, and would often wound them severely. The Pope 
heard of this, and recommended the Prince to show his 
detestation by pelting them with oranges, or nuts, or 
some sort of fruit, which would express his enmity as 
well, and be less serious in their effects. The Prince 
promised to obey, but took for his fruit the cones of the 
pine trees, which here contain eatable kernels, but grow 
to a great size, and are almost as heavy and hard as 
stones, and with these he continued to pelt the unfortunate 
Hebrews. 

The Ghetto is very dirty, and its streets are lined with 
little shops, some of which (according to the ladies) con- 
tain the best assortment of dry-goods in Rome ; while 
others are filled with old clothes, which seem the pecu- 



THE GHETTO. 141 

liar property of a portion of the tribe all the world over. 
The people preserve their unchangeable national physi- 
ognomy, though here it is less remarkable from its simi- 
larity to the Roman, in its aquiline nose and dark eyes. 
But this personal resemblance does not lessen the popu- 
lar prejudice against them, and I saw an example of it 
on my first visit to the Ghetto. A wretched-looking coun- 
trywoman, with her feet wrapped in rags instead of shoes, 
but with a cross on her breast, which showed her to be 
a Christian, was standing on the narrow side-walk, when 
a well dressed and portly Hebrew came behind her and 
told her to make room. She turned, and seeing who it 
was, she exclaimed with flashing eyes, and with a look 
of the most intense contempt, " Room for you, a Jew 
dog ?" She kept her place, and the rich Hebrew turned 
out for her into the gutter ! On leaving the Ghetto I 
stepped in at a cafe just outside of its limits, and while 
refreshing myself, I asked the waiter how he liked his 
neighbors. " Oh, they are very nice people," said he, 
laughing ; " I can hit them a good rap on the head and 
they never say a word back." Truly may they still ex- 
claim with Shylock, " sufferance is the badge of all our 
tribe." 

A church beside one of the gates bears, in Hebrew 
characters, an inscription from Isaiah, " I have stretched 
out my hands all day long to a rebellious people." This 
is indeed " adding insult to injury." Passing by it on 
new-year's day, I met a procession of monks, which 
13 



142 ROME. 

seemed like a nightmare-vision of ghosts. Behind two 
sentinels, who marched at a hundred feet apart, came a 
double file of beings, moving like men, but so covered 
from head to foot, face and all, in shroud-like garments 
with only two little holes for the eyes (as if they were being 
smothered in bags), that you could scarcely imagine that 
they called themselves human beings. First came 
twenty dressed in such shrouds, all white, excepting blue 
capes, and carrying a crucifix ; then as many more in 
blue shrouds with red capes, and bearing a picture of the 
Madonna ; some priests, dressed in black, with uncovered 
faces, followed, and they looked positively beautiful by 
contrast with the other horrible phantoms ; then came 
more of the hideous ghosts, and the procession was 
closed by a dense mass of men, women, and children. 
The priests chaunted a prayer, and at certain points, all 
the crowd burst out into a yell, worse than any Indian 
war-whoop, and then united in the chorus. The effect of 
the whole was most horrible, and more likely to frighten 
children into fits than to entice the Jews into conversion. 
I inquired the nature of the procession from one of the 
crowd, who told me, with a look of surprise at my igno- 
rance, that it was called " The Mission," and took place 
three times a year.* 



* A somewhat similar procession of men enveloped in black 
shrouds is sometimes met with in Florence, but there its object is 
not idle superstition, but practical benevolence. Its wearers are 
members of the " Congregazione delta Misericordia" or 



THE ISLAND. 143 

From the Ghetto an ancient bridge crosses one branch 
of the Tiber to the island of San Bartolomeo, which was 
formerly dedicated to iEsculapius, and faced with traver- 
tine into the form of a ship, an obelisk being its mast. 
Another old bridge crosses the other branch into the 



" Brotherhood of Mercy." Follow their rapid steps, and you 
will see them enter some poor house, the master of which has 
been suddenly stricken with violent disease, or has met with some 
dangerous accident, demanding immediate succor. They place 
him in a covered litter, as tenderly as if he were their brother 
by nearer ties than those of Adam, and raising the litter to their 
shoulders, six of them bear it carefully to the hospital, while 
others follow behind, to take their turn in the service of charity. 
Their gloomy costume is assumed that their good deeds may not 
be known, and the Grand Duke of Tuscany himself is enrolled 
in their number, and often secretly assists in the pious duty. A 
single stroke of the bell summons them to an ordinary accident ; 
two strokes to a more serious case ; and three to bear a corpse to 
the church. At the sound they leave the business or the theatre, 
or the society in which they may be engaged, and hasten to their 
place of meeting, rich and poor, side by side, feeling that " a 
touch of nature makes the whole world kin." When they have 
quitted the house of the unfortunate whom they have borne away, 
his suffering family will find that some one of their unknown 
benefactors has left behind a liberal alms. Such are some of the 
good deeds of the people, who are so often slandered, as being 
treacherous, revengeful and unprincipled, inasmuch as they are 
Italians, and as being superstitious, bigoted and immoral, inas- 
much as they are Catholics. When we add this to the thousand 
other examples of practical piety towards the " widow and the 
fatherless" and of unsparing and unselfish charity toward all men, 
which irradiate the gloom of this lovely but fallen country, we 
Protestants might better imitate their practice than assail their 
principles, and the best among us might profitably "Go and do 
likewise." 



144 



Trastevere, or " Beyond the Tiber" portion of the city. 
The inhabitants of the Trastevere claim to be the only 
direct descendants of the ancient Romans, and are, in 
many respects, in language, customs, and physical cha- 
racteristics, a distinct and superior race. They refuse to 
intermarry out of their own district, even with the other 
Romans, whom they call barbarians ; and I was told that 
a poor barber of the Trastevere had refused his daughter's 
hand to a German Baron. Rather than submit to such a 
misalliance with the Goths he would have reacted Virgi- 
nius with his razor. 

The ancient Palatine Bridge (now Ponte Rotto) retains 
two of its arches on this side of the river. The entrance 
to it is blocked up by a currier's shop, on passing through 
which, I found this bridge, the very first one built of 
stone in ancient Rome, now used as a place for drying 
sheep-skins ! While I was musing on this degradation, a 
man came on the bridge, and hastily approached me, 
without saying a word, but flourishing a long sharp knife 
in his right hand. The place was a capital one for an 
assassination, the parapets of the bridge being higher 
than a man's head, so as to hide the doings upon it, and 
the river flowing so conveniently beneath. When he got 
within a foot of me, and his knife within striking distance 
of my throat, he then first spoke, and began to beg very 
humbly for a few cents, as he owned the shop through 
which I had passed. He received his fee with many 
thanks, and then, taking a firmer grasp of his knife, he — - 



THE TRASTEVERE. < 145 

began to scrape a sheep-skin. My promising adventure 
proved to be only an inkling of one. 

A little lower down the river are the slight remains of 
the Sublician bridge, which Horatius Codes defended 
against the whole army of Porsenna, till his countrymen 
had broken it down behind him, and whence he then 
leaped into the river with his arms, and swam to the 
shore. The sight of such scenes of the classic stories 
which we read in childhood seems to possess a magic 
power of transforming words into realities, and fables 
into facts. 

The Church of Saint Cecilia (the interior decorations 
of which, in white and gold, are in unusually chastened 
taste) contains, in a shrine before its high altar, the exqui- 
sitely graceful statue of Saint Cecilia, in the precise 
attitude and drapery in which her body was found many 
years after her martyrdom. The statue is of white mar- 
ble, and represents a small and delicate female reclining 
on her side with face turned downwards, and hands com- 
posed as if in sleep. The posture is as easy and natural 
as life itself, and so skilfully is the drapery worked, and 
so plainly do the limbs seem to show through it, that you 
think, at the first glance, that it is indeed only a real semi- 
transparent cloth thrown over the statue. 

Leaving this church, and passing by a cemetery, the 

walls of which are faced with skulls, you reach the 

magnificent Corsini Palace. It is one of the largest and 

handsomest in Rome, and was the residence of Christina, 

13* 



146 ROME. 

Queen of Sweden. It is now famous for its gallery, 
which contains nearly six hundred pictures. The 
majority are necessarily commonplace, but it also pos- 
sesses many valuable Panninis ; two Canalettis, which 
are vivid fac-similes of scenes in Venice ; many fine 
portraits by Titian, Van Dyke, Giorgione, Rubens, &c. ; 
Guercind's Annunciation (in which the Virgin, with 
hands clasped on breast, and upturned face, is depicted 
with exactly the proper expression of gratefulness, 
humility, doubt, and adoration) ; and his famous " Ecce- 
homo." Carlo Dolce's hangs opposite to it, and seems to 
me a finer conception, looking less like a suffering man, and 
more like a patient divinity. Carlo has also here painted, 
under various characters, several of his lovely daughters. 
He had five, all beautiful ; he always took them for his 
models— for he could have found none better — and being 
very religious withal, he has repeated their faces again 
and again, under the names and with the attributes of all 
the saints in the calendar. " Saint Apollonia," in the 
gallery, is said to be a portrait of his eldest daughter ; for 
tradition has remembered the original of each, though 
they lived two hundred years ago, so affectionate and 
personal is the attachment to the arts in this their earthly 
Paradise ; and when I exclaimed to the old cicerone 
(who showed me a dozen of these portraits, all resem- 
bling and yet all differently charming), " What a beau- 
tiful family Carlo Dolce must have had,'' he replied, as 
if they were his own intimate friends, " Ah, yes, signore ; 



THE TRASTEVERE. 147 

beautiful and good !" Saint Apollonia was martyred by 
having all her teeth pulled out, and she is, therefore, 
always represented holding a tooth in a forceps. This 
distinctive symbol is well-known to all good Catholics, 
and the custode was quite shocked by my not thus at 
once recognizing the Dentist-tortured saint. But the 
gem of the gallery is Murillos Madonna and Child ; less 
brilliant than the Dulwich one, but very beautiful, as she 
looks you full in the face with sad presages in her eyes. 
The nine rooms which contain these pictures are mag- 
nificent of themselves, with their Venetian floors, which 
look like one immense slab of variegated marble, their 
chairs of crimson velvet and gold, and their fine pros- 
pects over all Rome. 

Opposite to the palace is the Villa Farnesina, on the 
walls of which the favorite story of the loves of Cupid 
and Psyche is well told in the frescoes of Raphael. The 
scenes of their history, from the time when Psyche is 
first shown to Cupid by Yenus, till her ascent to Olympus 
after her various trials, are depicted in the lunettes of the 
ceiling on a blue ground which emblems the heavens. 
Wreaths of flowers separate the subjects, and the corners 
are filled up by sporting Genii. In the next room Gala- 
tea appears, riding on a sea-shell car, drawn by dolphins, 
and surrounded by nymphs and tritons, while over her 
are hovering cupids with stretched bows and arrows 
about to be let fly. In one corner is Michael Angelo's 
visiting card— a colossal head sketched in charcoal by 



148 ROME. 

that artist, who, on calling here one day, and rinding his 
fellow painter absent, " made his mark" thus characteristi- 
cally.. It is honorable to the taste of those concerned, 
that it has never been effaced during the three centuries 
since it was executed. An upper room contains the 
Marriage of Roxana and Alexander, and in another, over 
the fire-place, is appropriately painted the Forge of Vul- 
can. What captivating substitutes are such decorations 
for the bare white walls, or tasteless papers, of most mod- 
ern houses ! 

Mounting the Janiculum hill, we find near its summit 
the church of San Pietro in Montorio, for which Raphael 
painted his Transfiguration, and which now receives a 
pension as a compensation for the picture being trans- 
ferred to the Vatican. In its cloister stands the beauti- 
ful little Temple of Bramante, erected at the expense of 
Ferdinand of Spain on the precise spot where Saint 
Peter is believed to have been crucified head down- 
wards. In the centre of the pavement of the temple is a 
hole in which the cross is said to have stood, and out of 
it a monk scraped up some of the consecrated earth, 
which he gave me, as a precious relic, in an envelope, 
stamped with the seal of the church, and inscribed, 
" Earth collected in the Temple of Bramante ; the place 
in which was crucified the Prince of the Apostles, Saint 
Peter, and in which, for every mass that is performed, a 
soul is liberated from Purgatory." 

While on this side of the river, it is convenient to visit 



THE TRASTEVERE. 149 

the Villa Pamjili-Doria, a mile beyond the Gate of San 
Pancrazio. Its casino contains much ancient sculpture, 
and its picturesque grounds are four miles in circuit, sha- 
ded by noble stone pines and divided by hedges of laurel 
and cypress. In one place fifty fountains gush from as 
many urns, and run into a stream, which is led down sev- 
eral cascades (under one of which is a subterraneous and 
subaqueous passage), and then allowed to spread into an 
irregular lake. When I visited the Villa in the middle of 
January, icicles hung from the urns, and the wind blew 
almost as bleakly as in New York, though on New Year's 
day I had been writing beside an open window ; but, 
according to the Priests, " the cold was a mortification 
peculiar to the holy season of Lent, and would continue 
till Easter, because it was cold when Peter sat by the 
fire in the house of the High Priest before the cock 
crew !" 



150 



XII. 

CARDINALS, MONKS, BEGGARS AND ROBBERS. 

The Cardinals of Rome monopolize all the offices and 
power of the Government. They choose the Pope out 
of their own body by a majority of two-thirds, in secret 
conclave, though Austria, France and Spain, have each 
the right to put a veto on one candidate. From the re- 
mainder of the " Sacred college" are taken the Gover- 
nors of provinces, the Cardinal Chamberlain, the Cardi- 
nal Secretary of State, the Cardinal Chancellor, the 
Cardinal Prefect, and so on. Not content with this, one 
of them is also Clerk of the Weather, and, like a new 
Joshua, prescribes the hours at which the sun shall daily 
set ; on the first of December, for example, he pub- 
lished an order fixing the time of sunset for the next 
forty days at half-past four, " French time." The Ro- 
man day was therefore to begin at five P.M., and noon 
to be " nineteen hours of the day," for those forty days ; 
the sun being supposed to stand still during that interval. 

One of the Cardinals — Prince Spada — died in De- 
cember, and his funeral was therefore an extra boon to 
foreign sight-seers. He was over ninety years old, and 



CARDINALS. 151 

was the last of the Cardinals who had accompanied 
Pope Pius VII. to Avignon. His trials had taught him 
benevolence (though it is innate in almost every Italian), 
and in his will he left ten thousand dollars to the Brother- 
hood of Mercy, of which he was a member, so as to 
give it the means of defending before the tribunals the 
honest poor who could not afford to fee lawyers. His 
body was taken in the evening to the magnificent 
Church of San ta Maria in Vallicella, after lying in state 
at his palace for two days . A troop of cavalry cleared 
the way, and behind them came the deceased Cardinal's 
gilded carriage, in which was placed his coffin, on each 
side of which sat a priest holding a torch and chaunting 
funeral prayers. The coffin was carried up the steps of 
the church, a passage through the immense crowd being 
opened by soldiers. I followed close behind it, and as 
the mob closed in, a pickpocket, on the very steps of 
the church, pulled out my handkerchief so clumsily 
that I felt the tug distinctly, though I could not seize the 
thief in the darkness and confusion. With this small 
loss I reached the church-door, but found it guarded by 
two soldiers, who refused admission to every one, even 
to priests. I slipped a paul in the hand of one of the 
soldiers, and the door opened for me as if by magic, 
while the priests, who had not invoked the potent St. 
Paul, were kept outside. The coffin was surrounded 
with candles, but, after a prayer was chaunted, the re- 



152 ROME. 

maining ceremonies were deferred to the next morning, 
at seventeen o'clock. 

At the appointed hour I returned to the church, and 
found it hung with festoons of black velvet edged with 
gold, suspended between the pilasters, which were also 
covered with black velvet, on which stripes of gold 
represented the flutings. At all the altars around the 
building priests were saying mass, being paid half a 
dollar for each service. The coffin had been raised on 
a lofty pedestal, and covered with a gilt canopy. The 
Cardinal's hat hung on its front, and beside it waved his 
banner as Prince ; the insignia of his spiritual and tem- 
poral dignities being placed side by side. Tall candles 
stood around it, giving almost the only light to the vast 
church, and a flock of priests, in their many-colored 
robes, watched beside it. The Swiss body-guard of the 
Pope were also present, in honor to the rank of the de- 
ceased. One by one the Cardinals entered, each pre- 
ceded by his usher, and followed by his deacon bearing 
his train, as on Christmas Eve. They tottered up to 
the coffin, and read aloud a prayer from an illuminated 
missal held before them by an attendant, while the little 
bells were tinkling at all the altars. Each next sprinkled 
the suspended hat with holy water, and seemed to look 
with much interest on the body of his late associate, as 
if speculating when his turn would come. They then 
retired to black covered seats, ranged around the high 



CARDINALS. 153 

altar, and when all had arrived, one of their number 
chaunted high mass, and the choir of the Sistine Chapel 
sang a dirge. At one point in the service four priests, 
bearing tapers, came up to the coffin, knelt before it, and 
after a short interval rose and retired, blowing out their 
tapers, doubtless with some allegorical allusion. When 
mass was ended, the Cardinals walked around the coffin, 
swinging smoking censers, and then bade adieu for ever 
to their late brother. 

The length of the ceremonies afforded an excellent 
opportunity of studying the physiognomy of the Cardi- 
nals, as they succeeded one another in the performance 
of the funeral rites. Most of them are of highly dig- 
nified and noble presence, but among them was a small, 
quick-moving personage, with a face full of queer knobs 
and angles, who was pointed out to me as Cardinal Mez- 
zofanti, the most accomplished linguist in the world. 
He is said to be master of an incredible number of lan- 
guages, and he speaks English, the most difficult of all, 
with wonderful correctness. His words are each uttered 
separately with the most perfect precision, though he 
says that his only teacher has been Sheridan's Pro- 
nouncing Dictionary, and it is by the cadence of his 
sentences alone, that he can be detected as a foreigner. 
A marvellous story is told of his facility in acquiring a 
new language. A criminal had been condemned to 
death, but could not be confessed, as he spoke only an 
unknown tongue, of which none of the priests could 
14 



154 



understand a word. Cardinal Mezzofanti was sent for, 
and after various trials, he recognized one word of the 
criminal's language as belonging to one of the oriental 
dialects, with which, however, he had no farther acquaint- 
ance. As the man was to be executed the next day, no 
time was to be lost, and accordingly the Cardinal hurried 
home, collected his grammars and dictionaries, and, by 
studying intensely all night, learnt enough of the lan- 
guage to convert and confess the criminal the next 
morning ! 

As the Cardinals left the church, some friars, waiting 
outside of the door, fell on their knees before them and 
kissed their hands most fervently, as if they were a 
superior order of beings. These Friars, 

" Black, white and grey ; and all their trumpery," 

form a distinct class from the Monks, though often con- 
founded with them. Both orders are bound in common 
by the three vows of Poverty, of Chastity, and of Obe- 
dience, but differ in all their other regulations. The 
Monks follow mostly the rule of their founder, St. Bene- 
dict, and are supported by a regular income, derived from 
landed property, and public or private endowments. 
They are therefore comparatively independent and respect- 
able, and their monasteries were the asylums of learning 
in the dark ages. Nothing has been made in vain — not 
even Monks — and few bodies of laymen have left behind 
them more titles to the gratitude of posterity than the 



MONKS AND FRIARS. 155 

much-abused wearers of the monastic robe and cowl. 
The Friars, on the other hand, founded by St. Francis, 
subsist entirely on alms and donations. They set out 
every morning on a pilgrimage among the faithful to 
collect their pious offerings, for which they repay them 
with their prayers. They are usually as ignorant as 
poor, and an aristocratic Jesuit priest, of whom I made 
some inquiries concerning them, with a most contempt- 
uous shrug disclaimed all knowledge of them. You 
meet them in every street, and their brown cloaks, 
cowls and sandals, have at least the merit of contrasting 
with the long black coats and broad-brimmed hats of the 
regular clergy. The priests, monks and nuns, in the 
city of Rome alone, amount to six thousand in a popula- 
tion of one hundred and fifty thousand, or one to twenty- 
five, and in the whole Papal territory, there are fifty- 
three thousand, most (though not all) of whom are use- 
less drones and burdens on the labor of the industrious 
population. The people, therefore, unite in abusing 
them, but they conduct themselves with extreme outward 
propriety, and are seldom seen in the streets after dark, 
or in any place of public amusement. Though much 
is said of their immorality, nothing is proven.* 



* They are not so prudent in Florence. While T was in that 
most fascinating of all cities, a trial was going on, which was said 
to have developed the following facts. A gentleman had long 
been jealous of the too frequent visits to his house of a certain 
priest. Returning home one day he saw the priest enter his door 



156 ROME. 

Many of the regular clergy, who have no special 
duties, are very poor ; and I was one day solicited, by a 
priest in very rusty black, to take a ticket in a Lottery 
for a curious clock which he had made entirely with his 
own hands, and valued at $90. I inquired of him, as a 
spiritual guide, if lotteries were not gambling, and there- 
fore wrong. " Oh no," said he, apparently surprised at 
such an idea, " they are licensed by the Government." 
This seemed to me a curious standard of morality for a 
priest, but I let it pass, and next objected that as there 
were nine hundred tickets, my chance of drawing the 

a little in advance of him. He immediately followed him in, but 
passed successively th/ough his whole suite of rooms (the last of 
which was the chamber of his wife, and in which he found her), 
without seeing anything of the priest. He made no inquiry, but 
told his wife to prepare immediately to accompany him to their 
country seat. She did so, and, as they were leaving the room, the 
husband quietly turned the key of a large chest in which he kept 
his valuables. They locked up the house, being as usual accom- 
panied to the country by their servants. Soon afterwards the 
priest was missed. Inquiry was made by his friends in all direc- 
tions, and, after a fortnight had elapsed, it appeared that he had 
been last seen entering this gentleman's house. It was forcibly 
entered and searched, but in vain, till some one bethought himself 
of breaking open the large chest. It was done, and there lay the 
priest. He had died of combined suffocation and starvation, after 
having gnawed one of his arms to the bone. The gentleman was 
arrested, but denied all knowledge of the priest. He said that he 
always locked the chest when he left the city, and that if the 
priest was then inside, he ought to have called out. The affair 
was finally hushed up as quietly as possible. This little " ro- 
mance of real life," is almost a parallel to Balzac's powerful sketch 
of The walled-un lover. 



BEGGARS. 157 

clock would be only one against eight hundred and 
ninety -nine. " But God may send you luck," said he, 
and seemed to think that this hope should at once induce 
me to comply with his pressing solicitations. 

The Beggars of Rome are a great drawback to the 
enjoyment of strangers. They cast a gloom over the 
whole city, and pain the visitor at every step by the 
sight of the misery which he cannot remove ; as it is so 
general, and is continually renewed by the short-sighted 
policy of the government, which crushes industry and 
commerce by its narrow-minded oppressions and restric- 
tions. This alone is enough to make Florence, which is 
the centre of a prosperous people, by far the most desira- 
ble residence. Here you are continually supplicated for 
the love of all the Saints to scatter your alms on every 
side. Sometimes it is a man worn down to a living 
skeleton by hunger ; sometimes it is a half-naked woman 
with a starving child ; but generally the beggars are 
sturdy fellows, who make it their profession, and who 
wear a badge in proof of their being regularly licensed. 
However benevolently disposed you may be at first, you 
soon become hardened to the appeals of this class, but 
find them very annoying by their pertinacity, till you 
learn the secret by which the Romans free themselves 
from their attacks. Words are useless ; you may repeat 
in vain that you have no change, but if you silently raise 
your open hand and wave it before them, they instantly 
cease their appeals. This is a final answer, and has a 
14* 



158 ROME. 

magical effect, as I proved every day after being instruct- 
ed in the secret.* Some of these beggars penetrate into 
the houses, and one presented to me a parchment docu- 
ment, duly signed and sealed, certifying that he had been 
converted to the Roman Catholic faith ; and was there- 
fore a worthy object of charity. When I gave him a 
trifle, telling him that it was for his poverty and not at all 
for his religion, he replied very coolly, " Just as your 
Excellency pleases." Many of them have regular stations, 
and the grand flight of steps leading up to the Trinita ale' 
Monti is occupied by a jolly old fellow, who runs about 
the landing-places upon his hands and knees, to which 
are strapped pieces of wood. He bids a cheerful good 
morning to every one who comes down or up the Scala, 
and clatters up to them on his wooden-shod extremities, 
expressing his pleasure that they are going to have such a 
fine day to see " the beautiful city," and finishing his gossip 
with the laughing inquiry, " And how much is your gen- 
erous Excellency going to give me this morning V 
Half a cent makes him very contented, and he will 
readily change a whole one, returning a half cent with 
profuse thanks. He is said to have become quite rich at 
this business, and to have lately given his daughter a 

* This open hand is very expressive in Rome ; the Post office 
clerk holds up his open hand to express that there are no letters 
for you ; and when you knock at a door, the servant looks out of 
an upper window, and holds up her open hand to say, " My mis- 
tress is at home, and, if you will wait a moment, I will come down 
and let you in." 



BEGGARS. 159 

wedding portion of five hundred dollars. Nearly every- 
body in Rome begs in some form or other ; a clerk in a 
shop asks for something for himself, when you have paid 
the regular price for the article ; and a coachman 
demands a buona-mano after it has been expressly includ- 
ed in the price.* The servant, who brings you an invi- 
tation from a Prince, asks for his Mancia, or present ; 
and gentlemen, by way of penance, go about in masks, 
with devotional money-boxes, which they carry into 
cafes and shake in your ears. Foreigners also take up 
the trade. A few days after my arrival in Rome, I 
received a note, correctly addressed, and begging in 
very well-turned phrases for some assistance to a 
young Englishwoman with a large family, whose husband 
was " unable to pursue his profession." It closed with 
hinting at the example set by Lord Powerscourt, who 
has since died at Rome, and who " gave a generous dona- 
tion of five pounds." It was brought to me by its writer, a 
pretty and lady-like young Englishwoman, and I afterwards 
learned that most of my English friends had received a 

* The regular system of Buona-mano, which is universal in 
Italv, is very unreasonably abused by most travellers After any 
service done for you has been paid for according to agreement, an 
additional present, or buona-mano (lirerallv good-hand), is always 
expected and given, its amount being proportioned to the way in 
which you have been served. The cost to you is no more, for it 
is taken into account in the first- demand, and the expectation of 
this reward stimulates your servant or tradesman to greater zeal to 
please. It resembles the English system of fees, but is superior 
to it in leaving the amount more at the will of the traveller. 



160 ROME. 

similar circular, and that the husband was " unable to 
pursue his profession," because he was in prison for 
stealing. A person, who called himself an American, 
was also said to be prowling about the streets, and levy- 
ing contributions on those whom he supposed to be his 
countrymen. 

That there should be occasional Robberies in Rome, 
where the starving and desperate poor are tantalized and 
tempted by the wealth displayed by the crowds of rich 
strangers, is not to be wondered at. It is only surprising 
that there are no more, particularly of foreigners, though 
they are rather shunned by the robbers, as being sup- 
posed always to go armed, for which a special permit is 
necessary. But no arms would be any defence against 
the insidious mode of attack, in which a man muffled 
in a cloak suddenly leaps from a dark door-way, and 
applies a knife to the victim's throat, letting the point 
tickle the jugular vein, and saying only " Money !" If 
any resistance be made, or if the robber be recognized, 
the fatal blow is at once given. At Naples they apply 
the knife to the stomach instead of the throat, but the 
sufferer by either system would probably think this " a 
distinction without a difference." At night every one 
walks in the middle of the street, to avoid the robber's 
tiger-leap from some lurking-place, and when two per- 
sons meet in a lonely spot, each shuns contact with the 
other, as in the times of the plague. I had frequently 
observed this mutual avoidance before I learnt the cause, 



ROBBERS. 161 

but did not fully credit the frequent reports of robberies 
and assassinations which used to be narrated every 
morning in the cafes, till one day I saw posted on the 
walls a " Notification of Sentence," announcing that 
two robbers would be executed at eight o'clock the next 
day, and that five more had been condemned to the 
galleys. The two under sentence of death had stabbed 
and robbed sixteen persons in one night ; but, in spite of 
these atrocities, their pardon had been warmly, though 
vainly, solicited from the Governor of the city. He is 
distinguished for his unrelenting firmness and vigilance 
in punishing crime, and, if his administration were to be 
long continued, he would produce a great reform in Rome ; 
but it is said that the Pope will soon reward him with a 
Cardinal's hat, and thus he will be removed from the 
sphere where he is so useful . That evening I met him 
at a ball, and the festivities seemed to be damped by the 
presence of one by whose orders two human beings, 
however guilty, were in a few hours to be put to death. 
They were guillotined the succeeding morning in the 
Via de* Cerchi, and a person who was present told me 
it was most horrible to see the second one lay down his 
head in the fatal groove, still wet with the warm blood of his 
companion. A week afterwards I passed the spot, and 
the scaffold had then been removed, but a little girl, who 
was picking up the chips which it had left, ran up to beg 
a baiocco, for pointing out a spot where the ground was 
still deeply stained with blood. The execution did not 



162 ROME. 

seem to produce any better effect than capital punish- 
ments usually do, for there were said to have been more 
robberies and stabbings on the following night than for a 
long time before ; and only three days afterwards a man 
was attacked by two others, just outside of one of the 
city gates, and killed with thirty wounds, though six 
other persons were in sight at the time. But every one 
runs away at a cry of murder, lest the police should treat 
them as criminals instead of witnesses ; or lest the ac- 
complices of the assassin should murder them too for 
bearing testimony against him. This is certainly not a 
pleasant state of society, but the fault is in the general 
remissness of the government, which allows a few ruf- 
fians to run riot in crimes which are heartily detested by 
the great body of the people. 



163 



XIII. 

A PROMENADE ON THE PINCIAN. 

The Pincian hill is the fashionable promenade of 
Rome. It is the Regent street and Hyde Park of the 
Englishman, the Boulevards and Champs Elysees of the 
Parisians, and the Broadway and Third Avenue of the 
New Yorkers. Upon it every fine afternoon are found 
all the fashionable dwellers in Rome ; citizens and stran- 
gers ; on foot, or horseback, and in carriages ; walking, 
riding, and driving. From the Piazza di Spagna, the 
head-quarters of strangers in Rome, you may ascend the 
westerly side of the Pincian by a magnificent stone stair- 
case a hundred and fifty feet wide, and composed of a 
hundred and thirty-five broad steps. It is relieved by 
spacious landing-places ; separates into two branches 
when half way up ; a little higher unites again into one ; 
and then turns anew to the right and to the left, to land 
you on the terraced promenade in front of the church 
Trinita de* Monti. Immediately before you rises one of 
those Egyptian Obelisks of polished granite, covered 
with hieroglyphics, which the ancient Roman Emperors 
brought from the land of the Nile as trophies of the extent 



164 ROME. 

of their empire, and which the modern Pontiffs have 
applied to the decoration of the public places of the city. 
A dozen of them occupy conspicuous sites and are among 
the most striking characteristics of modern Rome, so that 
an American artist, who had spent many years here, on 
visiting Paris, thought the finest object in the whole of 
that metropolis, was the obelisk of Luxor, in the Place 
de la Concorde, inasmuch as it reminded him so vividly 
of his well-loved Rome. 

Beyond the Obelisk stands the church of Trinita de' 
Monti, famous for the fresco of Daniele da Volterra, 
which represents the " Descent from the Cross," and was 
called by Poussin, the third greatest picture in the world. 
It is very powerful and life-like, but greatly injured by 
time, and more like Michael Angelo than Raphael. It 
was probably the model for Rubens' great picture of the 
same subject in the Cathedral of Antwerp. The church 
of late years has been kept generally closed to prevent 
the intrusion of ill-bred strangers, who used to lounge in 
it as in a cafe. After many vain attempts, I found it open 
on the festival of the epifania, the English twelfth night. 
The church belongs to a sisterhood of nuns, who inhabit 
an adjoining convent, and devote themselves to the educa- 
tion of the female children of the higher classes. On 
this occasion a cardinal was present, and Vespers were 
sung by the Nuns, hidden behind a grated gallery over 
the door. Their musical devotions were performed with 
exquisite taste and feeling, and some passages seemed 



THE PINCIAN HILL. 165 

to me sweeter and more touching than those of even the 
famed choir of the Sistine chapel. I was the only visitor, 
and, to avoid shocking their ideas of propriety, I knelt before 
the grated gates which separated the high altar from the 
rest of the church. Inside of them were likewise kneel- 
ing all the pupils of the convent, from eight to eighteen 
years old, the youngest in front and the rest in rows regu- 
larly increasing in height. They all wore long and 
thick white veils, but when vespers were ended, and they 
rose to go out by a side door, one of them, as she passed 
me, slily raised her veil, revealing a face of most brilliant 
beauty, and then dropped it again with a smile of triumph 
when she saw my look of eager admiration. Coquetry 
seems as inseparable from woman behind the iron grates 
of a convent, as in the saloons of society. 

Leaving the church, you see on your left hand the 
house of Claude Lorraine, quite picturesque in itself, as 
well as in its situation. His studio looks down on all 
Rome, and from it he saw many of those magical effects 
of light and atmosphere, which he has fixed on his can- 
vass. Opposite to it is the house of Poussin, and not far 
distant is that of Salvator Rosa. The natural beauties, 
which attracted these great landscape painters to the 
Pincian hill, still remain, to make it the resort of all 
strangers of taste, who daily climb it, to enjoy thence 
those delicious Italian sunsets, which bathe the western 
sky in a rosy glow, passing, by imperceptible gradations, 
through a transparent orange color into the deep an<^ 
15 



166 ROME. 

pure azure of the zenith. Strolling in the other direc- 
tion you find a green wall of laurel crossing the road, 
and through arched openings cut in it you enter the gar- 
dens of the Villa Medici, where you may ramble at will 
in the hedged walks, adorned with a profusion of statues 
and antique marbles. The back of the Villa itself is said 
to have been designed by Michael Angelo ; it is decorat- 
ed with medallions and basso-relievos, and was such a 
favorite with Claude that he has introduced it into many 
of his landscapes, particularly the great sea-view in the 
Pitti Palace. 

The Villa Borghese covers with its grounds the brow 
of the Pincian hill, a little beyond the Porta del Popolo. 
Its noble park and gardens are three miles in circuit, 
and are most liberally thrown open to citizens and 
strangers at all seasons, with a practical democracy 
which enables the poorest plebeian to enjoy scenes of 
taste and luxury which only many successive generations 
of aristocracy could have created. You may ride at 
will, beside nobles of all countries, in broad avenues, 
lined with statues, sprinkled by fountains, and terminated 
by temples ; or you may watch the peasants in their 
holiday costumes, making merry in the hollow of the 
Hippodrome ; or, if inclined to solitary meditation, you 
may turn into secluded wildernesses, where everything 
grows " at its own sweet will," and where you can 
scarcely realize that you are so near a great city. Near 
the entrance of the gardens is a lake, supplied by cas- 



VILLA BORGHESE. 167 

cades, overshadowed by weeping willows, and populated 
by statues. A little farther you pass two lodges, in the 
Egyptian style, guarded by obelisks. A neighboring 
arcade contains many antique fragments found in the 
grounds. A wall to your left is crowned with a row of 
aloes, planted in graceful vases. You pass under an 
aqueduct carried over a Doric portico, with the motto, 
" Ne quern mitissimus amnis impediat." A richly wooded 
park, in the English style, is intersected by avenues 
lined with elms and oaks, through which you get glimpses 
of fountains, temples, and artificial ruins. It is bordered 
with statues, on the pedestal of one of which is written, 
" If the gardens of Alcinous were offered to me, I could 
say that I preferred my own ;" and well he might, for 
those gardens of Homer could scarcely surpass these of 
Prince Borghese. Another Latin inscription invites and 
cautions the public to this purport : " The guardian of 
the Villa Borghese makes this proclamation. Whoever 
thou art, if free, do not fear here the shackles of laws. 
Go where thou wilt, seek what thou wishest, depart 
when thou pleasest. These things are prepared for 
strangers rather than for the master. He forbids me to 
impose severe restrictions on a well-mannered guest. 
Let good intents be here the only laws for a friend. But 
if any one, wilfully, knowingly, maliciously, should break 
the golden laws of urbanity, let him beware lest the pro- 
voked keeper should in turn break his tessera of friend- 
ship." Profiting by this liberality the painters of Rome 



168 ROME. 

transfer to their canvass many of the fine stone-pines, 
oaks, and cypresses, which have so long flourished there 
undisturbed, and some of which may be recognized by 
the American traveller as old friends, whose acquaintance 
he had previously made in pictures which had reached 
this country. 

The noble stone-pines are very characteristic of Rome, 
and especially of the Villa Borghese. They shoot up 
a straight and slender stem, a hundred feet high, and 
as bare of leaves as a ship's mast, till at its very top 
its branches spread out into the semblance of a gigantic 
umbrella, or an overgrown mushroom. They radiate on all 
sides from its centre, and are covered with a luxuriant 
thatching of foliage, which looks almost black on its 
under side, but whose top, gilded by the sunbeams, 
glitters with the brightest green. 

In the midst of the Park stands the Casino, or Palace. 
The marble balustrade before it is topped with statues 
and vases, and its outer front is covered with busts and 
basso-relievos inserted in the walls. You enter a spa- 
cious portico, filled with antiques, and thence pass into 
a grand " Saloon." Its arched ceiling is forty feet high, 
and is brilliantly painted in fresco, with a representation 
of the gods descending to the aid of the Romans be- 
sieged in the Capitol by Brennus. The pavement is 
formed of five large mosaic pictures of gladiators fight- 
ing with tigers, hunters stabbing deer, and the like. The 
walls are covered with arabesques and medallion basso- 



VILLA BORGHESE. 169 

relievos, and all around are ancient statues. Such is one 
room of one house of a Roman nobleman. On the same 
floor are eight more, distinguished as " Chamber of 
Juno," " Chamber of Hercules," &c, all richly deco- 
rated, and all filled with statues, busts, and other antique 
sculptures. The " Galleria" is of equal size with the 
" Saloon," but is even more richly adorned. The walls 
are divided by pilasters of Giallo antico, and oriental ala- 
baster, with gilded capitals and cornices. Between them 
are white relievos on blue grounds, like cameos, and in 
niches are porphyry busts of the Emperors, in alabaster 
drapery. The pavement is composed of variously colored 
marbles, and the ceiling is covered with arabesque 
paintings. In the upper story are several chambers 
filled with pictures, which are probably only the refuse 
of the collection in the city palace of the Prince, but 
which would set up a dozen galleries with us. In the 
large saloon is the famous statue of Pauline Buonaparte, 
in the character of Venere Vincitrice, executed by Ca- 
nova, after she had married Prince Borghese. She is 
half sitting, half reclining, on a cushion of white marble, 
supported by a gilded couch ; her head rests most grace- 
fully on her right arm ; in her left hand she holds the 
apple which she has just received from Paris as the 
prize of beauty, and she has not yet found time to resume 
the garments which she threw aside to captivate him 
with her charms. It is one of the finest works of 
Canova, but, knowing that its beauty is a portraiture from 
15* 



170 ROME. 

life, you are continually reminded of the naivete with 
which Pauline answered an English lady who was 
shocked at the nudity of the statue, and asked the Princess 
if she did not feel " uncomfortable" while she was sit- 
ting for it ? " Oh no," replied Pauline, totally misunder- 
standing the drift of the question — " not at all ; there 
was a good fire in the room." The family of late have 
become more fastidious, the present prince having 
married an English lady (since dead, however), the Lady 
Gwendolin Talbot, daughter of the Catholic Earl of 
Shrewsbury. You must therefore now inquire for the 
statue only by the name of " Venere Vincitrice ;" and 
when I asked the custode if it was not Pan line, he looked 
fearfully around the room for eaves-droppers before he 
dared to whisper, " Si, signore." 

In the Villa Borghese we have admired the magnificent 
results of the union of wealth and taste ; let us prolong 
our promenade a mile beyond the Porta Pia, and we will 
find a striking specimen of wealth without taste in the 
Villa Torlonia. On each side of the entrance are some 
very fresh-looking artificial ruins, consisting of half a 
temple, which never had its other half ; broken columns, 
which never were whole ; and tottering walls, carefully 
built so as not to fall. The Villa itself can be seen only 
with a permit, and on Saturdays, " when it does not 
rain ;" the owner having a just fear of the effect of mud 
on his splendors. The interior is of the most unsurpas- 
sable richness ; one room is painted and furnished in the 



VILLA TORLONIA. 171 

Egyptian style ; another is all Chinese ; a third is formed 
into a tent with silken hangings ; statues of Venus and 
Diana preside over the Bath-room ; all the walls, ceil- 
ings and furniture, are covered with painting and gilding ; 
the interior decorations of one small room alone cost 
$16,000 ; and the gorgeous gilded balustrades of the 
staircase, which are carefully wrapped up, except one 
which is left uncovered to astonish visitors, cost $12,000. 
One book-case in the library has its curtains drawn to 
display some shelves of English books, such as Shakes- 
peare, Scott, Byron, Irving, &c, all splendidly bound, 
but evidently never used. The Mosaics of the floor are 
so finely executed, that you are glad to find strips of 
carpet laid from door to door to walk upon. Everything 
is well done, but over done ; decoration is carried to 
excess ; you are dazzled by the gilding, and instead of ad- 
miring the beauty of the works of art, you only wonder 
at their cost, particularly as you are constantly reminded 
of it by the servants. The grounds around the Villa 
have been most elaborately tortured into piled-up hills, 
and scooped-out hollows ; the rocks are all artificial, and 
at last you can scarcely believe that even the water in 
the ponds is natural. An enormous grotto has been con- 
structed, and you wander in its caverns under huge sta- 
lactites ; but, all are too evidently made to order, and one 
of the party had his hat knocked off by a trailing branch 
of green ivy, which was found on examination to be 
made of painted sheet iron ! Above this grotto is, erected 



172 ROME. 

a Turkish mosque ; beside it is a conservatory built in 
imitation of a hall of the Alhambra, and covered with 
Arabic inscriptions ; near by is a large theatre, half com- 
pleted, but already covered with gilding. It seems as if 
Prince Torlonia, its wealthy proprietor, wished to have 
his gold always before his eyes. The Villa is inhabited 
only two months in the year, but has already cost two 
millions of dollars ; and yet, though the separate artists 
have each done their parts well, the effect of the whole 
is most incongruous and petty ; the want of one compe- 
tent controlling mind is everywhere visible, and you leave 
the Villa Torlonia, wondering equally at its prodigality of 
wealth and its parsimony of taste. 

On returning from such a promenade one day, at the 
Ave-Maria, or twilight, I saw a procession of monks, 
masked in their shroud-like garments, and bearing torches 
and crucifix, collected in the street in which I lodged. 
As I approached them I saw that they were clustered 
around my house, and on reaching my door I found it 
blocked up by a bier covered with a black pall, on which 
were worked in silver embroidery a scull and cross-bones, 
surmounted by a cross. This was rather startling, and 
I asked one of the brotherhood, whose eyes were gleam- 
ing through the little holes in his mask, what the matter 
was. " We are only going to carry away a dead man," 
said he. " Where from 1 Who is it ?" I eagerly 
inquired. " From this house," he replied, " a young 
foreigner on the first floor." This came quite home to 



a neighbor's funeral. 173 

me, for I answered to the description in every point, and 
in my surprise I thought that they might, by mistake, 
have come for me. At that moment, however, a coffin 
was brought down the stairs, and behind it came two 
gentlemen whom I recognized as the attentive friends of 
a young Belgian, who also lodged in the house, and who 
had been ill of Malaria during the two months that I had 
been his neighbor. He had died two days before (as I after- 
wards learned), but his death had been carefully conceal- 
ed from me, though our bed-chambers communicated by 
a badly fitting door, through which his dying groans had 
disturbed my sleep two nights before. The following 
day I had been told that he was better, and the succeeding 
night I had found that he was perfectly quiet ; but I had 
then no idea that it was the silence of death. Had 1 not 
chanced to come home at the precise hour of the funeral, 
my landlady would, probably, have continued every day 
to report him as better ; but here I now found him, and 
therefore, postponing for the time my indignation at her 
falsehoods, I bared my head and joined the two friends 
as a mourner behind the coffin of my late neighbor. Six 
of the shrouded monks put it on their shoulders, and the 
rest gathered around us, singing a solemn dirge ; and in 
this way we slowly walked to a neighboring church. 
Here the coffin was set down before the altar ; the 
monks stood around it with lighted tapers, one of which 
they put into my hand, and chaunted a wailing funeral 



174 ROME. 

prayer. When the service was finished, they took the 
coffin into the sacristy to be buried the next day, without 
farther ceremony ; and the two friends, with myself, 
went to dinner. Such are the contrasts of life and death 
in Rome. 



175 



XIV. 

SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 

Rome is the home of all Art, and therefore the coun- 
try of Artists of all nations. Wherever their bodies 
may have chanced to have been born, their souls are 
citizens of Rome. It is scarcely a metaphor to say that 
one inhales the spirit of Art in every breath that one 
draws in the atmosphere of the Eternal city. The great 
works of antiquity salute the stranger on every side. 
The inhabitants are gifted by nature with an intuitive 
sense of the beautiful ; and they welcome with enthu- 
siasm every species of artistical excellence. It is no 
wonder, then, that thousands of foreign artists have made 
it their temporary abode, and that many have adopted it 
as their permanent home. Here of old came Michael 
Angelo, Raphael, Annibale Caracci, Claude, Poussin, 
Salvator Rosa, and their compeers, as to the Metropolis 
of all art. They felt it a glory and an honor to live in 
Rome, and for this they forsook the place of their birth ; 
not loving it less, but on the contrary, with the most far- 
sighted patriotism, abandoning its domestic enjoyments, 



176 ROME. 

because they felt that here they were qualifying them- 
selves to honor it most worthily ; and their hopes have 
been most amply realized, for the works which they here 
achieved, have now made the humble hamlets where 
they were born, the shrines of throngs of enthusiastic 
pilgrims. In later times, Flaxman here executed his 
illustrations of Homer, and Canova produced all his great 
works. Among our own countrymen, Benjamin West 
and Washington Allston owe to Rome the development 
and cultivation of their genius. At the present moment, 
the city is thronged with Sculptors and Painters from 
the four quarters of the globe. Their studios may almost 
be termed continuations of the Vatican, and offer to the 
cultivated tourist rich stores of instruction and enjoy- 
ment. 

The greatest among them is Thorwaldsen — the son 
of an Iceland wood-carver. He came to Rome at the 
age of twenty-seven, and in his residence of fifty years, 
he raised himself to a parallel with the best sculptors of 
the more genial clime of Greece. His studio on the 
Pincian hill contains casts of all his greatest works. In 
its lofty halls we see 

" Human and life-like, with no sense of pain, 
Gods and crown'd heroes of the early age ; 
Chieftain and soldier ; senator and sage ; 
Benignant, wise, and brave again."* 

* Poems on Man ; by Cornelius Mathews. 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 177 

Chief among these are his twelve Apostles ; colossal in 
size, and designed to surround the altar of the Cathedral 
at Copenhagen. In their centre stands the Christ, and 
in the Vestibule are the four Prophets. They are a 
noble assemblage, almost supernatural in their grandeur ; 
and, while they all harmonize in general effect, each has 
a strongly marked expression and character of his own. 
Energetic enunciation is indeed peculiarly the attribute 
of Thorwaldsen. His Poniatowski monument is an 
equestrian composition, erected in the great square of 
Warsaw, surmounting a fountain ; from the water of which 
the noble horse, by a fine allusion, is made to seem to 
shrink back, as if from the current of the river Elster. 
The basso-relievo of " The Triumph of Alexander," has 
been called the great work of modern times, and com- 
pared to the friezes of the Parthenon. A volume could 
scarcely do justice to all the works which fill the 
spacious chambers of Thorwaldsen's studio ; but his 
basso-relievo of " Night" has been, like Pliny's doves, 
too universally popularized by cameos and mosaics to be 
overlooked. Night, as the Mother of Humanity, is 
represented by a winged female figure, sweeping grace- 
fully through the air ; her children nestle in her bosom, 
and are lulled to sleep by the poppies which crown her 
brow. Over her hovers the owl, her emblematic bird. 

Thorwaldsen lately returned to Copenhagen, and in 
March, 1844, he died in the fullness of years and of 
honors. Never had subject such a funeral. The King, 

16 



178 ROME. 

in deep mourning, attended by all trie royal Princes, and 
Ministers of State, received the body at the entrance of 
the church ; the streets were lined with troops ; orations 
were pronounced, and anthems sung over the body ; and 
a subscription for a monument was headed by the King 
himself, with twenty-five thousand dollars. Such are 
the honors paid to Art in monarchies ; should republics 
be outdone by them 1* 

Several English sculptors — Gibson, Wyatt, and Mac- 
donald, — have been many years settled in Rome. The 
first was so unsuccessful in his early career, that he was 
seriously advised to alter his name to Gibsoni, as the 
English (like too many Americans) patronized only 
Italian artists, and overlooked the claims of their own 
countrymen. He chose, however, to "bide his time," 
and now he is overrun with commissions, and at a recent 
visit to England he was received almost with ovations. 
Among the most graceful works in his studio, are " Cupid 
disguised as a Shepherd-boy," " Hylas carried off by 
the Nymphs," " Hero and Leander," &c. His statue 
of Huskisson lacks individuality and nationality ; for it is 
draped so classically that if, after a thousand years, it 
should be dug up from the ruins of Liverpool, it would 

* Those travellers who have visited the studio of Thorwaldsen, 
may congratulate themselves on their good fortune ; for, since his 
death, its halls have been stripped of all their contents, which 
have been taken to Copenhagen, in the same royal frigate which 
had so often been honored by bearing thither the original works, 
fresh from the master-hand. 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 179 

be taken for a Greek rather than an Englishman. 
WyatCs statues possess a Raphaelesque sweetness. 
The head of a nymph, entering the bath, is exquisitely 
lovely ; and the group of a shepherd-girl, sheltering her- 
self from the storm under the plaid of her young lover, 
is very natural and graceful. Macdonald is particularly 
celebrated for the truth and beauty of his busts. The 
chief Italian sculptors are Tenerani, Finelli, Tadolini, 
and Bienaime, who represents his favorite Psyche in 
every conceivable situation and position. 

First among the painters is Overbeck, the German 
Raphael, or rather Perugino ; for he condemns the later 
manner of the Prince of Painters, and says, " When 
Raphael forsook Perugino, God forsook Raphael." 
Another apothegm attributed to him is that " No one can 
be a good painter who is not also a good man." His 
own practice realizes his theory. He is a most devout 
Catholic, and consecrates all his genius to religious sub- 
jects, which he treats with the utmost purity and eleva- 
tion of style, and with a simplicity and freshness which 
appeal directly to the heart. His studio (in the old 
Cenci palace) is open to visitors on Sundays for an hour 
after noon, and each of his pictures preaches an elo- 
quent sermon. He receives you with extreme courtesy, 
but you feel hushed into reverence by his gracious, intro- 
spective, and saint-like countenance. " Himself the 
great original he draws," he " looks into his heart and" 
paints. Upon his easel, at my first visit, stood a pencil 



180 ROME. 

cartoon of " Christ Reproving the Pharisees," and the 
ideal propriety of expression was faultlessly perfect. 
As I examined the picture, O^erbeck stood beside me, 
gazing earnestly on it, with clasped hands and parted 
lips, as if he was wholly absorbed in the subject. Near 
it was another cartoon of " The Massacre of the Inno- 
cents." One mother was kneeling in the foreground, 
and lifting up her hands in the last agony of despair ; 
another lay prostrate with face on ground ; a third 
clasped her murdered child to her breast, as if she could 
not believe that it was dead ; and others in the distance 
were fleeing from the soldiers. If this picture were 
well colored it would surpass even that of Guido, at 
Bologna. Many other sketches were in the studio, and 
all were marked by striking conceptions and masterly 
drawing, combined with a mystic grace and quaint for- 
mality. All indicated the most perfect piety and integ- 
rity of heart, and had a charm of expression found 
nowhere else but in Raphael. 

Baron Camuccini is at the head of the historical paint- 
ers.* Dessoulavy is an English landscape painter, who 
never tires himself or his patrons in his idealizations of 
the picturesque scenes about Rome. Meyer is a Danish 
painter, who possesses great cleverness in depicting the 
Italian character in its various phases, particularly comic. 
Reinhart is the Nestor of the German artists, and has 

* Camuccini has since died, in September, 1844. 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 181 

inhabited Rome since 1789. But it is useless to attempt 
to enumerate even the distinguished painters resident in 
Rome. 

Our American Artists, without exception, are doing 
honor to themselves and to their country. Leutze has 
already a European reputation. The recent exhibition 
in New York of his " Return of Columbus in Chains," is 
a better eulogium upon him than any words could be. 
The achievements of Mr. Huntington, in the imaginative 
department of art, would perfectly satisfy the aspirations 
of most American painters, who have never seen higher 
models of excellence than are to be found in our own 
country ; but Mr. Huntington has learned from his own 
past experience what increased power native genius may 
derive from foreign cultivation ; and he has therefore 
returned to Rome, to pursue his studies with the aid of 
all the advantages which that city offers in such profu- 
sion, and thus to make himself worthy of yet higher hon- 
ors than those which he has already so justly received. 
Mr. /. E. Freeman rivals the Venetian school in the 
brilliancy and richness of his coloring. His picture of 
Psyche sleeping, with Cupid watching for her awakening, 
exhibits flesh tints and texture worthy of Titian. His 
beggar boy, a la Murillo, extending his hand for charity, 
while his. little sister sleeps in the sun at his feet, tells its 
story most expressively, and almost persuades you to 
drop a baiocco into the supplicant's out-stretched palm. 
Mr. L . Terry has nearly completed a grand composition of 
16* 



182 ROME. 

"Jesus among the Doctors in the Temple." The numerous 
figures, their attitudes and expressions, and all the acces- 
sories, are in the highest walk of art. Mr. G. L. Brown 
is the best copyist of Claude in existence, reproducing 
all his glowing atmosphere and translucent water in the 
true spirit of the original. His own landscapes are also 
full of poetical and Claude-like effects. Mr. Rossiter, 
Mr. Lang, Mr. Hoyt, &c, are other American painters, 
whose productions show the advantages of a residence in 
Rome. 

Sculpture, however, seems to be the most genial form 
of the development of American Art-genius. Powers 
and Greenough are in Florence, but in Rome is the studio 
of Crawford, whose poetic conception, graceful fancy, 
and classic feeling, have already placed him in the very 
foremost rank of art. He is a native of the city of New 
York, but has past the last ten years in Rome, in absorbed 
devotion to his art, and in unwearied study of those great 
exemplars of Phidias and his compeers, which fill that 
city with a marble population. The seed thus sown has 
already produced a bountiful harvest, and promises yet 
richer fruit. The countrymen of Crawford seem to be 
little aware of how much he has already achieved, and 
how lofty a rank is assigned him by the Roman critics, 
the most accomplished and fastidious in the world. His 
studio is filled with groups, figures, busts, and bassi-relievi 
— the undying children of his imagination — among all 
which the only one generally known in America is his 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 183 

Orpheus, which was modelled in 1839, and was the 
surprise and delight of all the artists of Rome, till the 
discriminating taste of some public-spirited citizens of 
Boston transferred the statue to their Athenaeum. The 
subject of Orpheus is conceived and developed in the 
genuine spirit of classical antiquity, but the figure is 
executed with the life-like reality of nature ; the final 
model of modern as well as of ancient art. The daring 
lover has lulled to sleep by his magic strains the triple- 
headed Cerberus, who crouches at his feet ; he passes 
this barrier, and presses forward, with his impatient head 
and heart in advance of his more sluggish feet ; one 
hand holds the potent lyre, and the other shields his eyes 
from the bright day which he is quitting, and aids him in 
striving to penetrate into the mysteries of Hades, which 
he is about to brave in pursuit of his Eurydice. The 
suppressed energy of the moment produces a happy union 
of motion and repose, and the action and attributes tell 
their own story. 

But this is only one of the artist's creations. It was 
followed immediately by a small statue of "Autumn," 
represented in the symbolical form of a winged child, 
running forward, with a sickle in one hand, and in the 
other a cluster of wheat-ears and fruit, appropriate to the 
season. It is now in New York, as is also " The Genius 
of Mirth ;"* which is embodied in a merry boy, who is 

* The former is owned by Mr. John Paine, and the latter by- 
Mr. H. W. Hicks. 



184 ROME. 

dancing in great glee to the music which he is striking 
from a pair of cymbals. He reminds us of that happy 
shepherd-boy whom Sir Philip Sidney describes in his 
" Arcadia," as " Piping as though he should ne'er grow 
old." The mirth of the sculptor has the advantage of 
being unchangeable as marble can make it. " Cupid in 
Contemplation''' 1 was modelled soon after the Orpheus, 
and has been twice executed in marble. The God of 
Love is pensively contemplating a butterfly, which 
emblems Psyche, or the soul ; whose mysterious mar- 
riage to Cupid is the theme of the most beautiful of all 
the Grecian myths. At his feet spring up thistles and 
roses ; in emblem of the nature of that passion, which, 
as Spenser tells us, contains " a dram of honey to a 
pound of gall." " The Shepherdess " is a beautiful 
youthful figure, carrying on her shoulder a lamb, which 
she has just rescued from a wolf, whose body, pierced 
by her arrow, she drags along in triumph. It was 
designed and executed for an American lady. A sixth 
work is a small group of " Mercury bearing Psyche 
to Heaven." A seventh is " A Boy playing at Marbles." 
He is on one knee, and is reaching forward with a 
grace, ease, and freedom from constraint, which display 
that perfection of art which conceals art. It is the best 
of all the youthful figures executed by this sculptor, but 
is not yet sold. An exquisite group of " Hebe and 
Ganymede" life-size, has just been commissioned by 
Mr. Charles C. Perkins, of Boston. Hebe, having 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 185 

spilled the nectar at a feast of the gods, has been 
deposed from her office of cup-bearer, and supplanted 
by Ganymede. With saddened face, downcast look, and 
finger poutingly to mouth, she is resigning the vase and 
goblet, which are the insignia of her lost station, to the 
young Ganymede. He receives them with kind reluc- 
tance, and soothingly looks up at her with a sympathetic 
and apologetic expression, wnich seems to say, " I am 
very sorry for you, my dear Hebe, but you know it isn't 
my fault." The group is, indeed, a little drama, the 
action of which has been arrested precisely at the point 
of greatest interest. Its winning sentiment will delight 
many, who do not appreciate the higher and sterner 
feeling of the Orpheus. 

Portraiture, in sculpture as in painting, is the lowest 
department of the art, requiring only powers of imita- 
tion, and dispensing with those of conception ; and 
Crawford has, accordingly, made but few busts, though 
those which he has executed, possess fidelity, simplicity, 
and elegance. One of his Ideal Busts, " The Bride of 
Abydos" has been exhibited in New York. It afforded 
me an excellent illustration of the effect of idealization, 
as I chanced to see in Rome the living model from which 
the mouth was moulded ; and, beautiful as was the flesh- 
and-blood original, the far more exquisite beauty of the 
expressive, sensitive, and impassioned lips of the Bust, 
showed most forcibly how the poetical conception of the 
true artist can improve on even nature. The heads of 



186 ROME. 

" A Vestal" and " Sappho" are classical and charac- 
teristic. The pedestal of the former is carved into the 
form of an antique lamp, and that of the latter into a 
harp ; a very happy use of those accessories which are 
the sculptor's language. 

More than thirty bassi-relievi, representative of reli- 
gious, classical and fanciful subjects, have been composed 
by Crawford. They evince, more than any other of his 
works, the fertility of his imagination, and his skill in 
artistical composition. Some of them have been executed 
in marble, and all have been engraved in outline. Among 
his Sketches in clay, is a Statue of Washington, which 
has been lithographed ; and a group of five figures repre- 
senting the Landing of Columbus. 

A colossal group of Adam and Eve is the last of these 
sketches, and for depth of feeling and power of expres- 
sion, it is unsurpassed by anything in modern art. The 
guilty pair have just been expelled from Paradise. 
Adam clasps his hands in almost hopeless supplication, 
and looks up to Heaven with a despairing, yet imploring 
glance of intense agony ; but he still struggles to bear 
his terrible sentence with the fortitude becoming to a 
man. He is resting on his right foot, while the other 
advances, and crushes the head of the serpent. Eve 
clings to him with feminine dependence, and buries her 
face in his bosom, but her whole person speaks of the 
most utter, abandonment of wo, which her weaker nature 
does not even attempt to resist. Her left arm is clasped 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 187 

around him, but her right hand is convulsively pressed 
against her eyes, so as to shut out the sight of the fatal 
apple, which lies at her feet. The group is supported by 
the trunk of a tree, blighted and lightning-blasted. The 
whole is as yet only roughly modelled in clay, but is 
already imbued in every part with the most perfect pro- 
priety and deepest intensity of feeling. It embraces the 
grandest subject in the whole range of sculpture, and 
promises to be the master-piece of the artist ; but it can- 
not be put into marble without an order. Should not the 
native city of the sculptor secure from him at least one 
great work ? 

The peculiar merit of Crawford's style (considered 
apart from his highest attribute, that of poetic imagina- 
tion) is its happy union of a classical spirit with a natural, 
though idealized, execution. The impugners of a classic 
taste in sculpture would have each generation begin again 
for itself, and work out its own experience, rejecting all 
the aids of antiquity. The same principle should make 
the geometer burn his Euclid and try to discover each 
theorem anew for himself, instead of starting from that 
platform, and in his turn advancing the science a little 
farther. The ancients were giants, and we may be pig- 
mies ; yet if we stand on their shoulders we shall be 
able to see even farther than they. The Greeks experi- 
mented in art, and finally attained, and have handed down 
to us, certain principles, laws, aad exemplars, approved 
by their most perfect taste and most delicate organiza- 



188 ROME. 

tion, the equal of which the world has never since seen. 
If we wander from these we go astray. Those theorists 
who decry a classical style, ringing the changes on the 
word American (which, in art, may mean anything — or 
rather nothing), and whose grand recipe is an Indian 
figure, mistake the province of the highest art ; which is 
not the preservation of portraits of either individuals or 
races, Indian or Greek, but the embodiment of the 
purest and highest ideal of beauty, physical, mental, and 
moral. This is identical in all ages and countries. 
Sculpture realizes it in the purest and most abstract man- 
ner, rejecting color and confining itself to mere form. If 
the poetical ideas, to which it seeks to give a local habi- 
tation, have been most happily conceived by the Greeks, 
those ideas should be embodied in the present age as 
well as in the past ; and if Nature then formed herself in 
more perfect moulds than now, her perfection should be 
adopted without regard to chronology.* 

The true artists of all ages must, therefore, be imbued 
with the same spirit, though its practical development 
will vary with circumstances. The great sculptors of 
modern times make the nature of their own day their 
first model, but they idealize it in a classical spirit. 
Those who are content with only copying what they 

* " Thou didst not slight with vain and partial scorn, 
The inspirations ot our nature's youih ; 
Knowing that Beauty, wheresoever 'tis born, 
Must ever be the footer-child of Truth." 

R. M. Milnes — Sonnet to Giovanni Bellini. 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 189 

see, are mere stone-cutters. Their admirers will be of 
that class, who were especially delighted with the " So 
natural !" ribbed-stockings and corduroys of the group of 
" Tam O'Shanter and Souter Johnny," which is far be- 
yond the Apollo Belvedere, as a copy of actuality. An 
ideal artist rejects such petty clap-traps of applause, and 
instead of trying to render permanent the vulgar and the 
trivial, he selects the highest attributes of the human 
form and improves even upon them. He is not content 
with blindly imitating even the finest living model 
which he finds, but he analyses the secret of its beauty, 
and seeks to discern what peculiarity constitutes its supe- 
riority. Having discovered this, he then seeks to 
carry it a little farther. Thus the ancients, finding that 
Nature proportioned the angle of the human forehead to 
each individual's degree of intellectuality, gave to their 
Jupiter, or Supreme Intellect, a front projecting even 
beyond the perpendicular plane. So, too, if an artist 
finds that one element of beauty consists in a certain line 
being greatly rounded, and that the beauty increases in 
proportion as the line is removed from straightness, he 
sees to what Nature is tending and striving to attain, and 
he, therefore, takes a step in advance of her, by making 
this line a little more rounded than it is in any model 
which he has yet seen ; for he has no right to assume 
that this model is nature's most perfect development. 
Such seems to be the tacit theory of the practice of the 
ancient sculptors, and of their pupil, Crawford. 
17 



190 ROME. 

Since the above was written, Mr. Crawford has 
returned to his native country, after an absence of ten 
well-employed years. The friends of Henry Clay have 
exercised sound taste and discrimination in profiting by 
the opportunity of the artist's presence to engage him as 
the sculptor of the statue which they propose to erect to 
the veteran statesman. But a yet greater design is now 
in agitation — that of a monument to Him who was 
" First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his 
countrymen." The subject has for a long while occu- 
pied the mind of our New York sculptor, and the visitor, 
who was admitted to the inner room of his studio in 
Rome, saw there various models of such monuments as 
would be worthy of the subject. One is a grouping of 
military and civic trophies, surmounted by an equestrian 
figure. Another is a colossal statue, the height of which 
is intended to surpass that of any other in the world, and 
to be at least ninety feet ; the famous figure of San 
Carlo Borromeo, on Lago Maggiore, being but sixty- 
six. The Committee, to whom the grand project of a 
Monument to Washington has been entrusted, should 
invite Mr. Crawford, and other competent artists, to pro- 
duce their designs, so that they might be enabled to 
select the most impressive plan offered by the best quali- 
fied artist. When this important point is settled, and the 
public are assured that the result will be an honor to the 
taste as well as the patriotism of the country, then, and 
not before, will flow in the necessary contributions, the 
sinews of art as well as of war. 



SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS. 191 

It is only by such great works of public ornament and 
patriotic commemoration that Art can be enabled to deve- 
lope its full powers in aiding the moral and intellectual 
progress of society. Private liberality seldom has a 
higher object than the decoration of a drawing-room. 
The public patronage, which enables the artist to depict 
great actions, and to perpetuate noble examples, is the 
most splendid, permanent, and honorable to a great and 
enlightened nation. It was this, especially, which con- 
tributed to raise the arts to excellence in Greece, and to 
revive them in Italy ; and from this alone can we hope to 
obtain similar results in our own land. If we desire to 
create an American school of Art, we should extend to 
all worthy American Artists that liberal and enlightened 
patronage of the Government, which a Roman Journal 
(at the conclusion of a eulogistic notice of the Orpheus) 
has invoked for Crawford, in the following joint compli- 
ment to the sculptor, and to the nation : 

" We hope very soon to learn that the country of this 
valorous sculptor, which raises so many monuments wor- 
thy of her power, has made use of the chisel of this 
young man to honor some of his fellow-citizens, and at 
the same time herself; and that she has thus shown her- 
self successful above every other nation, while it is given 
to her, to exalt with honors and rewards the living who 
render her glorious, and at the same time to procure by 
the Arts immortality for the dead."* 

* II Tiberino ; Giornale JLrtistico. 17 Febrajo, 1840. 



192 



XV. 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 



It has long been the fashion for travellers to stigma- 
tize the modern inhabitants of Italy, and particularly 
those of Rome, as spiritless and cowardly, superstitious 
and ignorant, effeminate and cruel. These voyagers 
seem to have feared that the unvaried praise which 
truth compelled them to bestow on the beauties of nature 
and art, would pall on their readers' taste, if it was not 
seasoned with some gall and vinegar, and they have 
therefore most liberally poured these condiments on the 
character of the people. But the unprejudiced observer 
will find that the natives of Rome have not become 
utterly unworthy of their illustrious ancestors. It is true 
that they are now enslaved by a narrow-minded hierar- 
chy, but they have ever made vigorous efforts to throw 
off the yoke. Their history, since the restoration of the 
Western empire, chronicles a constant series of contests 
with the German Emperors, the Popes, and the Nobles, 
till they were lulled to rest by the arts of the Medicean 
Pontiffs, and led to substitute literary for military glory. 
Of later years they have made frequent, though abortive, 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 193 

struggles for liberty, and at the present moment the 
Government is busily imprisoning and shooting the 
leaders of a new conspiracy. Their spies are in every 
house, and give information of the first whisper of dis- 
affection. The people are well aware of this, and 
therefore dare not openly utter their sentiments. A 
Roman, with whom I was walking on the lonely Cam- 
pagna, when the bad state of the road led me to speak 
of the indolence of the Government, stopped short — 
looked around him, as if he feared that the ditches had 
ears — and then, in a low whisper, though no one else 
was even in sight, he replied, " You are a foreigner, and 
you may say what you please ; but, for us Romans, our 
mouths " — and here he emphatically covered his with 
his hand — " our mouths are given us to eat and to drink 
with, but not to talk of the Government." On any appre- 
hension of a general rising, Austria marches down her 
troops, in overwhelming numbers, to the frontier of the 
Roman States, and thus crushes any hope of successful 
resistance. Even England has not disdained to become 
subservient to Austrian tyranny, by opening the letters 
of those Italian political exiles, who, like Mazzini, have 
fled to her as a land of comparative freedom But 
despite these false friends and active foes, the Repub- 
licans of Italy are undismayed and active in the cause 
of freedom ; and I have heard a Roman gentleman 
denounce the Government, and plead for liberty, with an 
enthusiastic vehemence which gave his. noble language 
17* 



194 ROME. 

such strength, power, and magnificence, as showed that 
soft effeminacy had been as unjustly imputed to it as to 
the people. 

The faults of the nation are mostly due to their Govern- 
ment ; their good qualities to themselves. The Govern- 
ment is so busy in regulating the affairs of the Church, 
that it cannot find time to attend to the temporal good of 
its subjects. The Cardinals, who administer it, are a 
century behind the rest of the world in political enlight- 
enment. They discourage the foreign intercourse, which 
alone supports the people, from the fear that their faith 
may be shaken. On these grounds they have just 
rejected the proposal of a company to construct a rail- 
road between Rome and Civita Vecchia, its Mediterra- 
nean port ; and when, a few years ago, the American 
Consul for Ancona applied for a reduction of the twenty- 
four days' quarantine imposed on account of the cholera 
on vessels arriving at that port from New York, he was 
told by the Cardinal-Secretary, " The Holy City does 
not care at all for commerce." They content themselves 
with the more important functions of regulating the size 
of the sugar-plums to be thrown during the carnival, and 
decreeing, on bills posted about the streets, that none 
must be larger or harder than the patterns deposited in 
the office of the police ! 

The Roman Government is, in effect, only one great 
Missionary Society for propagating the Roman Catholic 
faith over the whole world, and everything else is con- 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 195 

sidered subordinate to this grand object. In reference 
to it, the number of the Cardinals is fixed at seventy, as 
representative of the seventy disciples commissioned to 
spread the gospel throughout the world. All Rome is 
organized into a practical College of Theology, besides 
the various special institutions for religious education 
with which it abounds. Chief among these is the Pro- 
paganda, founded to qualify young foreigners from 
heretical countries to return to their native lands as 
missionaries of the Roman Catholic faith. All nations 
are here brought together, and at its exhibition in Janu- 
ary, forty-nine languages were spoken by the students. 
Among them was a Canzone, in Italian, by " Signore 
Commings di Washington.''' 1 Converts are eagerly wel- 
comed. An American, named St. Ives, is among the 
latest. A Scotchman, who united himself to the Church, 
has been ennobled under the title of Count Hawks le 
Grice, and receives an allowance from the funds of the 
Propaganda. 

Every other species of knowledge is not merely neg- 
lected, but positively discouraged. A man who distin- 
guishes himself in liberal investigations, is marked as a 
dangerous citizen and an object of the jealous and dis- 
trustful surveillance of the police, for the Government 
feels that ignorance is their strength. Instruction in the 
mere elements of knowledge — reading, writing, arithme- 
tic — and in religion, is indeed bestowed on the people 
with great copiousness, since in Rome, with a population 



196 ROME. 

of one hundred and fifty thousand, there are three hun- 
dred and eighty primary schools, which employ four hun- 
dred and eighty teachers, and receive fourteen thousand 
scholars. But these schools are under the direction of 
the priesthood, who make use of them as powerful 
engines for instilling into the minds of the rising genera- 
tion their own prejudices, and the doctrines best adapted 
to discourage investigation, and to impress the duty of 
unreasoning submission to the powers that be. The 
people are taught that their own country and government 
are the best in the world. Of America they have a con- 
fused notion, which can scarcely be called an idea. Its 
inhabitants are generally supposed to be black, and I 
was once asked by a Roman lady how many wives we 
were allowed to have. When I answered her " Four," 
she inquired (interpreting me seriously) if we were 
Turks in our religion too ? A young Roman, employed 
in the iron-manufactory at Tivoli, left it a year ago to 
emigrate to America, and went to Ancona to embark. 
But he there heard that they had slaves in America, and 
"I was afraid," said he, "that when I got there they 
would make me a slave, and never let me see my friends 
again, and so I turned about and came home !" 

But cramped and hedged in as is the mind of the Ro- 
man people, it displays unsurpassed acuteness, activity 
and power, in the few subjects in which it is allowed fair 
play. In theology, their depth of learning and subtlety 
of reasoning are admitted to be wonderful, even by those 



i THE MODERN ROMANS. 197 

who dissent from all their conclusions. Their antiqua- 
ries bring the whole range of classical literature to bear 
upon the ruins and relics of their city ; and Liceti would 
devote fifty folio pages of the closest print to an old lamp, 
while Martorelli wrote two large quarto volumes in eluci- 
dation of an antique inkstand. The most common people 
have a remarkably graceful turn of thought, and a happi- 
ness of expression in their every-day language, which 
constantly reminds you that they are an old people, the heirs 
of many generations of cultivated taste. Their wit needs 
no eulogy, for the rest of Europe has paid it the highest 
possible compliment, by adopting the word Pasquinade, 
as the most forcible title for a satirical epigram, such as 
those which are secretly attached by the daring wits of 
Rome to the mutilated statue of Pasquin* Their deli- 
cate organization is shown by their extreme sensibility 
to perfumes, and to the slightest impression on their 
nervous system. A (ew grains of calomel, which a north- 
erner would scarcely feel, would nearly kill a Roman ; 
and this superior sensitiveness is a peculiarity of their 
minds as well as bodies, and renders them such enthusi- 

* One of the most perfect epigrams in existence is that exhibited 
by Pasquin . during the French invasion of Napoleon : 
" / Francesi son tutti ladri." 
" JYon tutti, ma Buona-parte." 
On another occasion, when a young Roman, named Ccesar, 
married a girl called Roma, Pasquin addressed the husband with 
" Cave, Ccesar, ne tua Roma Respublica fiat.''' The next day 
the man replied, " Ccesar imperat ;" to which Pasquin promptly 
responded, " Ergo coronabitur." 



198 



astic admirers and critical appreciators of all the 
achievements of the Fine Arts. The government gladly 
encourages their devotion to these pursuits in the hope of 
thus turning their minds away from politics. Here, then, 
their enthusiasm finds its only vent, and instead of shout- 
ing for Hickory poles, or Ash saplings, they idolize a 
favorite painter, or deify a prima donna. Indeed, I was 
forcibly reminded of an American " Mass meeting," by 
the deafening hurricane of frenzied applause which 
greeted the farewell appearance of Cerito at the principal 
theatre of Rome. 

It cannot be denied that Rome furnishes many remark- 
able examples of Superstition, but the city can scarcely 
be called its head-quarters, which rather exist in seclud- 
ed villages, while in the metropolis the great concourse 
of strangers wears off many prejudices. Thus my land- 
lady would not admit that I was a heretic, although a 
Protestant ; " For," said she, " heretics do not believe 
in any God ;" and when I remarked that the priest of 
Ara Cceli would not have shown me the miraculous 
Bambino, if he had known that I was an unbeliever in it, 
she replied with a truly Catholic charity, " Why not ? 
God embraces all!" Such liberality is, however, rare 
among the lower classes, who are superstitious from 
ignorance, while the nobles are kept so by their confes- 
sors from interest ; but in the middling classes scepti- 
cism is very common, though prudence generally keeps 
them silent, for the Inquisition still exists here, though 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 199 

greatly modified and deprived of its claws and teeth by 
the liberal spirit of the age. A witty physician had long 
been in the habit of ridiculing the Madonna and other 
holy subjects, though often warned that he was in dan- 
ger. At last one night a carriage stopped for him, and 
he was taken to the Inquisition. He was then examined 
— but without anything like torture — and asked, " Did 
you on such a day, three years ago, say so and so ?" 
All his offensive remarks had been secretly noted down 
by spies, and he could not deny any of the charges. He 
was sentenced to be imprisoned in a Dominican convent 
for three months, and to attend all the penitential prayers 
at all hours of the night. When these irksome duties 
were ended, he was dismissed, but told that, if he ever 
offended again, he should be banished. He came home 
effectually tamed, and never again said a word againstthe 
Madonna. After all, this is not much worse than our 
own Inquisition of Public Opinion. 

Indolence is most unjustly charged on the people. 
The laborious tillage, the canals for irrigation, the com- 
bined corn, olive and wine, all prove the industry of the 
agricultural population, and though they repose during 
the sultry hours, they make amends by their early rising. 
The inhabitants of the city find but few outlets for their 
industry, but are persevering and ingenious in their 
labors, ill-rewarded as they are. Almost the only busi- 
ness of Rome is the manufacture of Cameos, Mosaics, 
and Picture-copies, and the streets are lined with shops 



200 ROME. 

for their sale to foreigners, by whose money the whole 
city is supported. " If strangers did not come here, we 
should all starve," said a hotel-keeper, and it is too true. 
The people live entirely upon their winter visitors, and 
subsist during the summer upon the remnants of their 
superfluous expenditures during the previous season. 
Their former glory is their present livelihood ! Even 
the Princes do not disdain to receive the money of the 
Northern barbarians ; for the Prince Pamfili-Doria sells 
the best butter in Rome at his grand Palazzo in the Corso ; 
and a scientific book, by the Cardinal Prince Massimi, 
descriptive of a great engineering work at Tivoli, is to be 
bought only of himself, at his palace, instead of at a book- 
store. 

But even admitting the faults of the Roman people to 
be as great and as numerous as their worst detractors 
charge, they would be made pardonable by their warm- 
hearted charity, " which covereth a multitude of sins." 
Their practical benevolence surpasses that of any other 
nation. The many poor among them share their mite 
with the poorer ; the very beggar, who has been fortu- 
nate in his alms-seeking, divides his gains with his less 
lucky comrade ; the rich bestow bounteous and systematic 
charity ; and the number and magnificence of charitable 
establishments for the relief of suffering humanity are 
unapproached in any other country of Europe. Hos- 
pitals for every form of disease, and for all classes of 
the wretched, abound in every city, and their inmates are 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 201 

zealously and kindly tended by self-sacrificing Sisters of 
charity, who devote themselves to these painful duties, in 
the just belief that they are thus rendering the most ac- 
ceptable religious service. Other charitable offices are per- 
formed by various confraternities, similar to the Miseri- 
cordia of Florence. Of these, one secretly sends relief 
to needy but respectable families ; another pays off op- 
pressive debts, contracted by the honest poor in times of 
sickness and accident ; another relieves friendless pris- 
oners ; another seeks out the sick poor ; and another 
still, when all other benevolent exertions have proved 
fruitless, carries the dead with decent ceremony to the 
grave. When we find the feelings which prompt these 
manifold acts of kindness, extending through every class, 
we can pardon them their transgressions of some other 
points of the moral law. 

The society of Rome is highly prized by those who 
are fortunate enough to be admitted into its private circles. 
The graceful wit, poetic enthusiasm, and warm-hearted 
frankness, which characterize the people, are set off to 
the best advantage by their social freedom, and their un- 
constrained manners, divested of the usual shackles of 
prudish formality. Many grand balls are also given 
during the fashionable season, and a description of one 
will answer for all. Your invitation, sent a fortnight in 

advance, tells you that " The Prince and Princess 

beg the Signore - to do them the honor of coming to 

pass the evening in their palace, at eight o'clock." On 
18 



« 



202 ROME. 

the appointed evening you enter yonr carriage at ten 
o'clock, and half a mile before reaching the palace, you 
find a file of carriages extending from it that distance. 
After a long trial of patience, you are driven into the 
palace court, and set down at the foot of the grand mar- 
ble staircase, covered for the occasion with scarlet cloth. 
The first ante-chamber is crowded with the servants of 
the guests, holding their masters' cloaks. Beyond these 
are other rooms, through which your name is echoed by 
the announcing servants (generally undergoing many 
strange transformations), and at last you enter the grand 
saloon, where you are received by your host and hostess. 
A numerous suite of magnificent rooms is now open to 
you, some lined with paintings, others devoted to chess 
and cards, and one even supplied with newspapers (among 
which is usually Galignani's omnipresent " Messenger," 
for the benefit of the English guests) ; but the music 
will soon attract you to the ball-room, which is the focus 
of the crowd. Here a full orchestra perform the finest 
airs from the last opera, and you may either dance to 
their inspiring strains, or listen to the notes " by distance 
made more sweet," in a quiet corner of the spacious and 
numerous apartments, in some of which you may find 
yourself almost alone, though a thousand guests are 
present. These grand re-unions are too thickly sprinkled 
with English to be national, but nearly all the Romans 
present are covered with the stars and ribbons of various 
orders of knighthood, and the ladies are dazzling in dia- 



THE MODERN ROMANS. 203 

monds. The noble ladies of Rome need not, however, 
any such decorations, for they are the most beautiful race 
of women in the world. Their complexions have a 
cloudless purity like the inner petal of the magnolia ; 
their dreamy eyes reveal dizzying wells of passion in 
the depths of their intense darkness ; and their magnifi- 
cently developed forms unite the charms of Venus with 
the dignity of Juno. If you are stoical enough for cool 
criticism, you may fear that the progress of years will 
convert their rounded outlines into ungraceful obesity ; 
but, contenting yourself with the present moment, you 
must admit them to be noble specimens of humanity ; 
and if you are familiar enough with their delicious lan- 
guage to enjoy their spirituel and enthusiastic conversa- 
tion, you will return home, in the small hours of the 
morning, delighted, beyond all your anticipations, with 
the Modern Romans. 



204 CONCLUSION. 

We have now concluded our survey of the leading 
objects of interest in the Eternal city; and superficial as 
it has necessarily been, we may yet readily conceive 
how each day, which an American passes in Rome, adds a 
year to his intellectual life. He comes, from a world 
discovered only three and a half centuries ago, to a city, 
the history of which goes back twenty-six hundred 
years, and which has impressed its characteristics in 
each epoch of that long period upon still existing 
reliques, scattered over the vast area once covered by its 
monuments. Everywhere he is met by thrilling memo- 
rials of great events, which he had read of in childhood, 
as of things of another world. Each day is crowded 
with incidents ; and the differences of customs, and the 
pojver of associations, lend a charm to even the most 
common-place occurrences. He finds the flood of new 
ideas so copious and rushing as to be actually oppres- 
sive. His mind is stimulated and heated almost to the 
excitement of fever. Even in the churches, he cannot 
find relaxation, for the striking ceremonies of the ritual 
are inconceivably powerful in impressing the soul 
through the eye and the ear. If he enter even when 
the altars are deserted by their officiating ministers, his 
eye will be caught and his admiration aroused by some 
master-piece of painting. The Fine Arts, whose 
trophies meet him everywhere, indeed create in him a 
new sense ; and, far from palling on his appetite, their 
beauty grows more and more upon him as his acquaint- 



CONCLUSION. 205 

ance with them increases, till they become at last so 
indispensable to his enjoyment, that their want leaves an 
aching void in his daily life. The noble language, too, 
is no small item among his minor pleasures, and he 
learns to love its very sound as with a personal affection. 
The attributes of the people harmonize with it, and he 
receives constant and exquisite gratification from the 
general development of beauty and grace ; which is an 
almost universal result of that innate sensitiveness to 
their elements and their effects, which pervades all 
ranks. " With slow, reluctant, amorous delay," he 
leaves this paradise of taste ; and, although he has 
learned to prize more highly than ever the political 
and religious privileges of his own free land, still, 
when he calls to mind the proud Memories which have 
been inherited by the Romans — the bounties lavished by 
nature upon their lovely country — the genius and beauty 
which seem their birthright — what they have been, and 
what they may again be, and, beyond all doubt, event 
ually will be — he is tempted to exclaim, in imitation of 
Alexander to Diogenes, " If I were not an American, I 
would be a Roman." 



FINIS. 



207 



APPENDIX. 

HOW TO SEE ROME. 

The objects in Rome which the stranger is bound to visit, if 
only for a moment, and to assure himself that they are not worth 
seeing, are so numerous, and scattered over so wide a space (the 
circuit of the walls being fifteen miles, and many excursions be- 
yond them being necessary), that without a systematic arrange- 
ment, he will waste much time and labor in unprofitably retracing 
his steps, and, after all, find at last that he has left much unseen. 
To lessen this evil to those of his readers who may hereafter visit 
Rome, the writer has prepared on the spot, from his hard- 
earned experience, the following arrangement of the Lions of 
Rome, in the precise order (much more convenient and symme- 
trical than that of Vasi) in which they should succeed each other, 
so as to secure the greatest economy of time and fatigue. They 
are arranged in Groups, each referred to some of the " Seven 
Hills," or other leading objects. The Antiquities are printed in 
Macft ILetUr; the Churches in Italics; the collections of 
Pictures and Statuary in small capitals ; and the miscella- 
neous objects in ordinary Roman letters. Their description should 
be studied in Murray's invaluable " Hand-book for Central Italy," 
and each day's intended route examined on the map, the previous 
evening. 



208 t APPENDIX. 

1. GROUP OF THE CAPITOLINE AND PALATINE HILLS. 

Capitoline Hill. Piazza. Capitol Museum. View 
from Tower of Capitol. Sarpcian flock. &• Maria 

d'Ara Ccdi. Jilamerrine prisons- ftabularium- 

Koman iFornm. <kxz\\ of Sqjtimius Bairns. 
QTimple of GToncorb. (ftintpl* of Saturn. Sempk of 
ttespasian. Column of JJljocas. Academy of S. Luca. 
Church of S. Luca. 0. <&5riano. Sample of Jili^ 
nexva (EljalriMca. it! aria Ciberatric*. S. Teo- 
doro (fremple of Eomnlus). t)ia Sacra. STempis 
of Antoninus anb Faustina. S. Cosimo e Damiano 
(Qje-mple of Eemus). Basiliraof (Eonstantine. S. 

Francesca Romana. QircJ) of @TitUS. Palatine Hill. 
JJalace of ll)£ (KcesarS- Farnese Gardens. Villa Pala- 

tina (or Mills). Sample of t)enus anh Home. JiUta 
snoans. &rcl) of Cons taurine. Coliseum. 

QLox be'Conti. ®emple of Jjallas JHineroa. 
$,rcooe' flantani &empie of Nertm. iFornm of 
iftrajau. Trajan's Column- ®omb of jBibnius. 

S, Maria di Lore to. 

2. GROUP OF THE QUIRINAL AND VIMINAL HILLS. 

Torre delle Milizie. Villa Aldo.br andini. <S. Silves- 
tro Hi Monte Cavallo. Colonna Gardens (iZTempie of tl)e 
£»UU)- Palazzo Rospigliosi. Pal. della Consulta. 
Piazza di Monte Cavallo. Castor and Pollux. Pal. 
Pontificio, Pontifical Gardens. 



HOW TO SEE ROME. 209 

Viminal Hill. S. Andrea al Noviziato. S. Carlino. 
Quattro Fontane. Piazza Barberini. Fontana del Tri- 
tone. Studij of Thorwaldsen, Tenerani, Bienaime, 
Crawford, &c. Cappuccini. Pal. Barberini. S. 
Bernardo. Fontana dell'Acqua Felice. S. Maria della 
Vittoria. jBatl)0 of HDiocktiaU. S. Maria degli Angeli. 

3. GROUP OF PORTA PIA AND PORTA SALARA. 

Villa Barberini (Hxtiu0 of t)0USe of SttllttSt, &Z.). 
Porta Pia. Castruttt |3rcet0rixxm. Villa Torlonia. 
CollTtttbatittH in Villa di Luzzano. S. Agnese fuori 
le Mure. S. Costanza. Porta Salara. Villa Albani. 
Villa Ludovisi. 

4. group of the pincian hill. 

Piazza di Spagna. Barcaccia. Scala. Trinita de 1 
Monti. Houses of Claude and Poussin. Villa Medici. 
Villa Borghese. Casino. Raphael's Casino. 

5. GROUP OF THE CORSO. 

Porta del Popolo. Piazza. S. Maria del Popolo. 
Studij of Gibson, Wyatt, and MacDonald. JftaitSO^ 
Uttttt of QUtgitStUS S.Carlo. Pal. Borghese. Pal. 
Ruspoli. S. Lorenzo in Lucina. Pal. Chigi. Piazza 
Colonna. Column of &ntouitttt0. Post Office. 



210 APPENDIX. 

Monte Citorio. Custom House ({ftetttple of Qitttoni^ 
ttll0 Jj)insJ- S. Ignazio. Pal. Sciarri. Fontana di 
Trevi. S. Maria a Trevi (de' Crociferi). S. Marcello. 
S. Maria in Via Lata. Pal. Doria-Pamfila. SS. 
Apostoli. Pal. Colonna. Piazza di Venezia. Pal. 
Torlonia. S. Marco. 

6. GROUP OF THE PIAZZA NAVONA. 

Gesu. S. Maria sopra Minerva. JJatttfy&Crtt- Colle- 
gio della sapienza. Pal. Madama (Passport office). S. 
Luigi de' Francesi. S. Agostino. S. Maria della Pace. 
S. Maria delV anima. Piazza Navona. Fountains. S. 
Agnese. Pal. Braschi. Statue of Pasquin. Pal. 
Massimi. S. Andrea della Valle. &[)CatX£ of $0111'- 
£££. Museo Campana. Trinitd de' Pellegrini. Pal. 
Spada. Pal. Farnese. Pal. Cancelleria. S. Maria 
in Vallicella (Chiesa Nuova). S. Giovanni de' Fiorentini. 
House of Raphael. Bridge of S. Angelo. 

7. group of st. peter's. 
Castle of S. Angelo. (Jttausokttm of 4§abrian). 

Raphael's Palace. Piazza of St. Peter's (Colonnades, 
fountains, and obelisk). Basilica of Saint Peter's. 
Vatican Palace. Vatican Gardens. Porta Angelica. 
Monte Mario. Villa Madama. 



HOW TO SEE ROME. 211 

8. GROUP OF THE TRASTEVERE AND ISLAND. 

S. Onofrio. Pal. Farnesina. Pal. Corsini. Porta 
S. Pancrazio. S. Pancrazio. Villa Pamfili-Doria. 
Fontana Paolina. S. Pietro in Montorio. S. Maria in 
Trastevere. S. Francesco a Ripa. S. Maria del orto. 
S. Cecilia. S. Giovanni Grysogcno. S. Bonosa. Ponte 
Rotto. Ponte di S. Bartolomeo. 

Island of the Tiber. S. Bartolomeo. Simple of 
(fettlapittS- Ponte di Quattro Capi. 

9. GROUP OF THE GHETTO AND VELABRUM. 

Ghetto. Pal. Cenci. Pal. Costaguti. S. Carlo ai 
Catinari. Fontana delle Tartaruche. Pal. Mattel 
S. Angelo in Pescheria. JJorttCO of (Dctatria, &J)ea~ 

tre of Jttarcellus. S '. Niccolo in Carcere (temple of 

IttttO, &t). S. Giovanni Decollato. %Xt\) of Satttt3 

€luabrifon0. &rcf) of tl]e <K>olbsntitf)0. S. Giorgio. 
Cloaca itta^ima. S. Maria in Cosmedin. JJorca oi 
berita. temple of besta. Staple of iForlmta bi~ 
rilis. House of Rienzi. Cloaca ittajeima. $1x1- 
rijrum Cittus. 

10. GROUP OF THE C^ELIAN HILL. 

Cselian hill. S. Gregorio. S. Giovanni e Paolo. 

bitmrium axib Spoliarhxnt. &rcf) of UDolabdla. S. 

Maria della Navicella. Villa Mattei. S. Stefano Ro. 
tunda. S. Clemente. 



212 APPENDIX. 

11. GROUP OF THE ESQUILINE HILL. 

J3att)0 0f ®ittt0. £i£tf£ Bah- S. Pietro in Vincoli. 
S. Martino ai Monti. S. Prassede. S. Pudenziana. 
Obelisk. S. Maria Mag giore. Colonna della Yergine. 
S. Antonio Abate. Qxtl) of OteUienttS. QLtO^UQ of 

Matins. 

12. GROUP OF PORTA S. LORENZO, PORTA MAGGIORE, AND 
PORTA S. GIOVANNI. 

Porta S. Lorenzo. Basilica S. Lorenzo. Porta S. 
Lorenzo. S. Bibiana. Sample of Jilittenm iftebira. 
Cohttttbarium. Porta Maggiore. QqntamtB. ©amb 
of th»e Baker ^urgsaces. ©0tnb of i\)t impress 

fleUtta. Porta Maggiore. f&empU of tkttttS ClttO 
(lupib- S. Croce in Gerusalemme. &tttpl)itl)eattmn 
(QLaBlXZXlBZ- Porta S. Giovanni. S. Giovanni Laterano. 
Baptistery. Later an Palace. Scala Santa. Villa 

Massimi. 

13. group of aventine hill, and porta s. paolo. 

Monte Aventino. $. Maria Aventina. S. Alessio. 
S. Sabina. S. Prisca. S. Saba. 

English burying-ground. JJgramib of Cains Ces- 
titl0- Monte Testaccio. Porta S. Paolo. Basilica of 
S. Paolo, fuori le mure. S. Paolo alle tre fontane. 



HOW TO SEE ROME. 213 

14. GROUP OF THE APPIAN WAY. 

I3at!]0 Of CaracaUa. S. S. Nereo ed Achilleo. 

ftotnb of 0cipio. Colmnbarmttt of figias. &rcl) 

Of UlrttSttS- Porta S. Sebastiano. ftotttb* of J)ri0- 

cilia, #c Domine quo vadis. QToimttbarimtt Of tl)£ 

0iat)£0 of &tt0tt0ttt0- Basilica of S. Sebastiano. (&ata>~ 

combs. Circus of Hontttltts. ffrentple of Eonwto. 
&omb of Cecilia Jttctdia. &otnb of tije Smniii. 
temple of $$acrt)U0. fountain of ^jgma. temple 
of tlje TOtw© Eeoicttitt0. 



19 



214 



NOTE TO PAGE 24. 

THE DUOMO OF MILAN. 

The only Rival of St. Peter's is the Duomo of Milan ; and 
wonderful as is the former, I am so heretical as to find the latter 
far more beautiful and impressive. Imagine a white marble 
pyramid miraculously sprouting, and shooting up" from every part 
of its surface, spires, pinnacles and statues, and you will have a 
better idea of this most glorious Duomo, than by comparing it 
with any other Church. " None but itself can be its parallel." 
" Facile Princeps." The Cathedral of Cologne is indeedinspired 
by the same feeling, and is akin in some of its details, but it is 
only the bare single rose, while here in the more luxuriant soil 
and more balmy sky of Italy, the flower puts forth so many new 
leaves, and so doubles and re-duplicates its petals, that the luxu- 
riant double rose of Milan can scarcely recognize its prototype in 
the single wild flower of Cologne. 

This mountain of marble sends out on each side clustered but- 
tresses connected with the main structure by flying arches, which 
spring through mid air, and form noble bridges, which are half in- 
visible from below, and on which angels might not disdain to tread. 
From the front also, six buttresses project and rise above the 
sloping summit of the body of the Church. All these are filled 
with statues, each in a niche of its own, and from each buttress 
rise pinnacles on pinnacles, and spire branching from spire, each 
crowned with statues, so that the whole church is covered with a 
marble population of Saints and Angels. The whole front is also 
embossed with sculptures in high relief, wherever the statues 
have left room ; and these pictures carved in stone record the 
various scenes and events of sacred history with more distinctness 
and expression than could any words. Between them are 
fantastic faces, smiling and frowning on you like mischievous 
sprites ; and among other whims of the sculptor is a female head, 



NOTE. 215 

covered with a marble veil, through which you seem to see 
features, which in reality have never been chiselled out, but 
only artfully suggested to the fancy. Days might be given to the 
study of all these devices, and at every visit much would be 
found both new and beautiful. The whole building is indeed a 
poem written in stone. 

But great as is your admiration while you are below, you find 
when you mount to the roof, that you had not yet seen the tithe 
of its splendors. A winding staircase conducts you up, and you 
see that the same lavish and tasteful labor is given to the most 
secluded and seldom seen portions, as to the most conspicuous. 
The artists seem to have been deeply impressed with the feeling 
that nothing was too good for the service of the Divinity, to whom 
their labors were consecrated. The slabs which cover the roof, 
and on which you walk, are of fine marble. The backs of the 
statues, which can be seen only with particular pains, are found 
to be as highly finished as the fronts. The rich ornaments are in 
the most out-of-the-way corners, and everything shows that the 
workmen felt themselves engaged in a true labor of love. Every 
part of the roof seems perfectly alive with statues. Each of the 
spires and pinnacles, and each of their branches, bears a colossal 
statue. Among the rest is placed one by Canova, and the fact 
that it passes unnoticed among the rest, is a sufficient proof of the 
great merit of all. The inhabitants of this city of marble Saints 
are now nearly seven thousand in number, and when the designs 
are fully carried out, ten thousand marble statues, each different, 
and each of itself a model, will people this noblest of Cathedrals. 
The readers of Wordsworth will remember his fine allusion, in 
his poem on " The Eclipse of the Sun on Lake Lugano," to the 
darkness shading, as with sorrow, the faces of these Saints and 
Cherubs. 

Like every other beautiful object which excites the imagination, 
the Duomo of Milan is finest by moonlight. While viewing it 
thus illuminated, with its buttresses and pinnacles of white 
marble half shadowed, half shining, like stalactites, half ice and 
half rocks, and with all the details subdued in the general 
effect, the idea flashed across me that the Duomo was an imitation 
of an aiguille (or " needle-rock"), of the Alps. The Aiguille de 
Dru at the side of Mont Blanc, as seen by the spectator looking 



216 APPENDIX. 

up at it from the source of the Arveiron, is almost a perfect model 
of the front of the Duomo. It has the same general shape and 
outline ; the needles of rock which shoot up from every part of it 
are fac-similes of the pinnacles of the church, and the snow on 
these peaks may well represent the crowning statues. 

If this theory have any plausibility (and it is none the less 
true because never before suggested), our admiration of the Duomo 
is fully justified, for its beauty is an imitation of Nature. All 
analogy is in favor of the probability of the suggestion. Gothic 
arches are generally supposed to have been at first imitations of 
avenues of trees, and the similarity is very striking in Rosamond's 
Bower, at Hampton Court, and Voltaire's Grove, at Ferney. 
Church spires were doubtless first suggested by the tall and 
tapering cypress tree. The Eddystone Light House was con- 
structed by Smeaton, in exact imitation of the trunk of an old 
oak tree, spreading at the bottom and swelling out at the top, and 
it has stood while all previous ones have disappeared. Sea-walls, 
for resisting the waves of violent storms, are now shaped according 
to the form given to sea-shores by the waters. It is thus that all 
the most perfect and most beautiful works of art have been exact 
imitations of natural objects ; and why then may not the glorious 
Duomo of Milan be a copy of an Aiguille of Mont Blanc ? 



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